I’m Not a Monster Presents… Where is Austin Tice?
Josh Baker enters a dangerous world of fear, greed and betrayal as he sets out to uncover the truth behind one of the biggest missing-person cases of our time - the abduction of American journalist Austin Tice. Josh - creator of two of the BBC's most award-winning and widely listened-to investigative podcasts, I'm Not a Monster and The Shamima Begum Story - returns for his most ambitious chapter yet, in a major new series from BBC Radio 4 and NPR's Embedded. This is not the retelling of a closed case. It is a real-time investigation into a disappearance that has remained unsolved for more than a decade, conducted in close contact with Austin's family. What started out as a personal effort to help a mother find her son has turned into a multi-year journalistic investigation stretching from the corridors of power in Washington DC to the depths of the Syrian security state. Austin Tice is a journalist, law student and former Marine officer, who vanished in Syria in 2012. Since then, competing stories have emerged about his fate. In some, he is alive - held in a cell and waiting to be rescued. In others, he was smuggled out of Syria and hidden away. In the darkest versions, he died long ago. His disappearance has reached the highest levels of power - from presidents to popes - yet remarkably little is known about what happened to him. Investigative journalists Josh Baker and Sara Obeidat begin following Austin's trail long before the fall of the Syrian regime. Then everything changes. The regime collapses, and the black box of Syria's intelligence state opens. Sources step forward, unprecedented leaks arrive and doors to secret bases that had been sealed for years open. Josh and Sara speak to spies, search secret prisons and track down alleged war criminals in hiding, uncovering information that has never been made public and making discoveries that generate international headlines. The audience follows every breakthrough as the investigation closes in on those who may know the truth - while Syria is transformed and powerful interests compete to shape what happens next. Some claim Austin was working for the CIA. Others say he was simply a young journalist trying to make his name in war reporting. His fate has become entangled in secret negotiations and geopolitical power struggles that are still unfolding. At the centre of it all is his mother, Debra Tice, who has never stopped searching for her son. There are people who know exactly what happened to Austin. Some of them do not want the truth to come out. So where is Austin Tice?
Episodes
An American mother living in the heart of the ISIS caliphate. Her husband an ISIS sniper. Her 10-year-old son forced to threaten the U.S. president in a propaganda video shown around the world. She claims she was tricked into taking her young children to war-torn Syria, but where does her account end and the truth begin?
Over four years journalist Josh Baker unravels a dangerous story where nothing is as it seems. From the depths o...
A suicide bombing in Iraq and a home video from inside the ISIS caliphate begin the search for a family trapped in Syria. A desperate plea arrives from an American woman who says she wants to escape the Islamic State group with her young children.
This episode includes descriptions of violence and some upsetting scenes involving children.
Reporter: Josh Baker Written by: Josh Baker and Joe Kent Producers: Joe Kent and Max Green Prod...
A man who says he’s a people smuggler offers to help the family, while a drive around a suburb in Indiana reveals their past. Sam’s father adds a new twist on who his daughter really is.
This episode includes descriptions of violence and some upsetting moments involving children.
Reporter: Josh Baker Written by: Josh Baker and Joe Kent Producers: Joe Kent and Max Green Production assistant: Lucie Sullivan Composer: Sam Sl...
The Islamic State group forces Sam’s son Matthew to spread its propaganda. Josh searches the woods of Idaho looking for a man on an elk hunt. Then an obscure tweet leads him to Syria to try to find the family.
If you know something that you think might help the investigation please email notamonster@bbc.com
Reporter: Josh Baker Written by: Josh Baker and Joe Kent Producers: Joe Kent and Max Green Production assistant: Lucie Sul...
A young boy in the mountains of Northern Iraq makes Josh question what he knows about Sam. Then ten days searching war-torn Syria lead to an offer of help, but can it be trusted?
This episode includes descriptions of violence and some upsetting moments involving children.
Reporter: Josh Baker Written by: Josh Baker and Joe Kent Producers: Joe Kent and Max Green Production assistant: Lucie Sullivan Composer: Sam Slater Mixed by: Tom B...
Josh is face-to-face with Sam after a year trying to track her down. On a military base in Syria, she begins to tell her side of the story. She says it all started as a family holiday.
Reporter: Josh Baker Written by: Josh Baker and Joe Kent Producers: Joe Kent and Max Green Production assistant: Lucie Sullivan Composer: Sam Slater Mixed By: Tom Brignell Series Editor: Emma Rippon
Commissioning Executive: Dylan Haskins Commissioning ...
A torture prison, buying slaves and a dramatic escape: Sam continues her account of her years in Raqqa.
This episode includes references to sexual abuse, extreme violence and some upsetting moments involving children.
Reporter: Josh Baker Written by: Josh Baker and Joe Kent Producers: Joe Kent and Max Green Production assistant: Lucie Sullivan Composer: Sam Slater Mixed by: Rod Farquhar Series Editor: Emma Rippon
Commissioning Executi...
As Josh starts to uncover more about the family’s past, Sam tries to explain away some of the many discrepancies in her story. Then, a connection to the FBI raises new questions about her.
If you know something that you think might help the investigation please email notamonster@bbc.com
Reporter: Josh Baker Written by: Josh Baker and Joe Kent Producers: Joe Kent and Max Green Production assistant: Lucie Sullivan Composer: Sam S...
Josh retraces Sam’s steps in Syria and asks could she have been an ISIS supporter all along? He meets her old neighbours in Raqqa, visits the infamous torture prison where she says she was held and meets an Islamic State group member who knew her personally.
This episode includes references to violence.
Reporter: Josh Baker Written by: Josh Baker and Joe Kent Producers: Joe Kent and Max Green Production assistant: Lucie Sulliva...
After years of insisting she’s innocent, Sam pleads guilty and Moussa’s exes reveal more about the man that led her to Syria. Sam’s team claims she was “a wife under the thumb of her violently abusive and radical husband” but the prosecution says she has “credibility issues” and tells stories that serve her personally. So how long will she spend in prison?
This episodes contains some upsetti...
Sam’s son Matthew was just seven when he was taken to Syria and the Islamic State group. He thought he’d never see America again. Now he’s back with his dad and talks of the “sweet relief” of being home.
Josh finds out how he and Sam’s other children are doing now.
This episode includes references to violence and some upsetting moments involving children.
Reporter: Josh Baker Written by: Josh Baker ...
What happened to the family Josh was staying with when the Islamic State group struck in 2016?
I’m Not a Monster began after Josh was injured by an ISIS truck bomb in Mosul, Iraq. If it wasn’t for an old contact reaching out to see how he was doing, he may never have heard about Sam and Matthew.
Now he returns to the Iraqi city and finds that while the fighting may be largely over, the people of Iraq are facing a differen...
In Northern Iraq, Josh finds out how two people you’ve been asking about are doing now.
In 2014, the Islamic State group killed thousands of members of the Yazidi religious community and kidnapped and enslaved many, many more. Ayham and Saud were both taken from their families and ended up in Syria where they were eventually bought by Sam and her husband Moussa.
Josh first met them just after they’d escaped ISIS with Sam ...
Since the series ended, so many of you have got in touch wanting to know more. With the help of criminal psychologist Dr Julia Shaw, Josh answers your questions.
Presenters: Josh Baker and Dr Julia Shaw (host of the Bad People podcast on BBC Sounds) Mixed by: Tom Brignell Producer: Joe Kent Production Co-ordinator: Janet Staples Editor Emma Rippon
“I’m Not a Monster” is a collaboration between BBC Panorama and FRONT...
Investigating the story of Shamima Begum. At 15, she ran away from her London home with two school friends to join the terror group ISIS in war torn Syria. Now she wants to come back. It’s a tale that has gripped the world, but there are different ways to tell it.
Josh Baker has been following the story since 2015 when Shamima Begum left for the Islamic State group. For Series 2 of I’m Not a Monster he investigates what...
Three London schoolgirls disappear, heading for a war zone. Four years later only one emerges from the ashes of ISIS. Nobody knows what really happened to her. Josh Baker meets Shamima Begum in Syria to begin unpicking her story.
Almost eight years earlier, he was filming in Shamima’s local mosque when news broke that she and her friends had gone missing, it made global headlines. He was there when their families came asking...
Following Shamima Begum’s route reveals a dangerous Islamic State group smuggling network, but that’s not all. A local taxi firm isn’t what it seems and a gangster threatens to make Josh “disappear.” It all ends in an underground carpark with a stack of secret documents and a warning.
Reporter: Josh Baker Written by: Josh Baker and Joe Kent Producers: Josh Baker, Sara Obeidat and Joe Kent Field producer...
The man who smuggled Shamima Begum to Syria claims he was spying for Canada. What's the truth? And could she and her school friends have been stopped from reaching the Islamic State group?
Reporter: Josh Baker Written by: Josh Baker and Joe Kent Producers: Josh Baker, Sara Obeidat and Joe Kent Field producers: Hussam Hammoud Composer: Firas Abou Fakher Theme music: Sam Slater and Gunni Tynes Mix and sound design: Tom Brignell Produc...
Friendship, propaganda and the promise of paradise - why Shamima Begum left London at 15 for the Islamic State group in war torn Syria. But how did she ignore the group’s brutal violence? And who convinced her to go?
The feature length documentary, "The Shamima Begum Story", will be on BBC2 at 9pm on February 7th.
Reporter: Josh Baker Written by: Josh Baker and Joe Kent Producers: Josh Baker, Sara Obeidat and Joe Kent Composer:...
Shamima Begum’s new life under ISIS isn’t what she expected. She says what she thought would be paradise is more like a prison. At just 15 years-old she finds herself trapped in an ISIS guesthouse, where the only way out is to get married. In his first interview since 2019, Islamic State group fighter Yago Reidjik reveals how he became her husband and what their life together was like.
This episode contains very strong ...
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