August 25, 2024 • 42 mins
Alan Metcalfe’s business activities are all pointing to US megachurches he was involved with and to conservative political groups in the US including former President Donald Trump. Could this be where the missing millions ended up?
The Missing $49 Million is an eight-part investigative series by news.com.au, hosted by award-winning finance reporter Alex Turner-Cohen.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Thank Heaven for the dreamers. Over the past century. They
have gone against the grain, flouted convention, disputed accepted truths,
marched to their own drummer, and in the process set
new benchmarks for human achievement. One such dreamer is computer
system designer Alan Metcalf. He dared to dream the impossible.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Safe world will change the world because it'll enable, for
the first time for us to take the whole world
economy into cyberspace.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
That was a commercial Allan and his teammate comparing himself
to people like Martin Luther King and Neil Armstrong. So
Alan clearly had a high opinion of himself. In fact,
it's his god complex that may help me finally solve
the mystery that I've been trying to answer since the
start of this series. What happened to the forty nine
(00:54):
million dollars of other people's money which went missing after
Alan died. I'm running out of time. It's my last
chance to find the missing millions in the next hour,
because this is the final episode. Let's finish what we started.
(01:16):
My investigation has taken me into the depths of Allan's past.
I've looked into whether Saffold's was or ever could be viable.
Then followed the money trail wherever it took me from
geraldon a sleepy town in country Australia to the billionaire's
playground of the Cayman Islands deep in the Caribbean Sea,
(01:39):
and of course explored whether he himself was really dead.
But there's one more possibility, and it's about to take
me into the world of national and international politics, from
Pauline Hansen to mega churches and Donald Trump, the former
US president who at the time we're making this might
(01:59):
very well will also be the next president of the
United States.
Speaker 4 (02:07):
I had a guy that was a CEO stealing from
my client, and he would steal money from my client,
put it in his bank account, and then he would
make donations to political parties. Now we have rules about
how much you can donate that are capped per individual,
but that's a whole other investigation is campaign financing.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
This is Leah Wheatolta, the ex FBI agent turned private
detective who gave me advice on how to follow a
money trail in episode six. Now Leah is telling me
this other ways people can funnel money through political donations.
Speaker 4 (02:47):
Any donations if they're in the States, any donations, if
you know who they donated to, you can pull those
reports and like their public record with the state and
so then you can run those and you can see
wine item names and how much they donated.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
Hang on. This is the first time I've considered this.
Up until this point, I've been focusing my efforts on
where the vanished money might have been stashed or what
Alan might have bought with it. But is it possible
the forty nine million dollars that hundreds of investors entrusted
to Alan might actually have been given away? I'm Alex
(03:26):
Turner Cohen, a finance and investigative reporter from news dot com.
Are you and you're listening to the Missing forty nine million?
This is the final episode False Profit.
Speaker 5 (03:50):
I've been involved in a few not for profit groups
which are in the political space, which is sort of
how I have that initial connection to Alan.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
This is Jaimar and Covids. We've briefly heard from him before.
He's a Safe Worlds investor who put ten thousand dollars
into the scheme. When I meet Ji in his Sydney office,
he helps me understand Alan's political views because he shares.
Speaker 5 (04:14):
Them our group is interested in preserving our status as
a constitutional monarchy.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
So a bit of history. The British invaded Australia two
hundred years ago and today it still has the British monarch.
Not everyone is happy about it. And back in nineteen
ninety nine there was a big push for Australia to
become a republic. There was a national referendum on the issue.
And Jai says his group, Australians for Constitutional Monarchy, campaign
(04:41):
to keep the royal family in power, and he says
this group was key to winning the debate.
Speaker 5 (04:47):
So since then we've sort of kept that group together.
There's been moments where people have still suggested change. There's
been nothing that's gained any meaningful traction, but that group
is still there to defend the status quo.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
Gai tells me. Alan was also a believer in the
status quo. In fact, according to a news article from
twenty fifteen, one of the main reasons Alan wanted to
get Safewold off the ground was to help what he
described as the prominently Christian middle class. Alan was able
to make quite an impression on Ji and his pro
monarchy group.
Speaker 5 (05:21):
It was clear that his overlapping views was quite consistent
with what we believe. It sort of inspired us, I guess,
to have a bit of confidence in what he was proposing,
and I think initially that's probably what allowed us to
give him the time of day. And then from there
I think, you know, we sort of learned a bit
more about him as a person, but also about the platform. Ultimately,
(05:44):
obviously the platform disappointed that's unfortunate, but initially we were
interested to explore it.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
Jai was convinced and put a small amount of cash
into Safe Worlds, but making money wasn't his main goal.
He saw the tech platform as a way to prom
his political ideals.
Speaker 5 (06:02):
My primary interest in it wasn't so much the return
on that investment, although I did definitely expect and hope
to see a return on it. More importantly, I wanted
to support the political objectives of the system.
Speaker 3 (06:16):
Jai had taken a gamble on Safe Worlds, and he
wasn't the only person in his group that got behind
the scheme. There was someone else in the picture, someone
who's kind of a big deal.
Speaker 5 (06:27):
So the two people who took the meeting with him
there was myself and David.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
Flint, Professor David Flint is a well known conservative columnist
now well into his seventies. Flint's always been a big
supporter of Alan Metcalf and his wife Mary. He was
on their advisory board and went on to launch his
own Safeworld's TV channel on YouTube. The video looks quite
amateur and David has a shock of white hair and
a distinctive voice.
Speaker 6 (06:53):
Hello, I'm David Flint. I'd like to tell you about
this program, Conversations with Conservatives. This is being broadcast in
audio and video via safe World's tvv.
Speaker 3 (07:06):
David isn't just a commentator, though, he has real influence
in the real world. During the twenty seventeen national vote
on whether to legalize same sex marriage, Flint called on
people to vote no because he said it was unconstitutional.
Speaker 6 (07:22):
For those who don't know me, I'm a conservative. What
this means to me is that I believe, in the
immortal words of the American founding fathers, that all men
and women have been endowed by their creator with certain
unlienable rights.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
Last year, Flint opposed Australia's Indigenous Voice to Parliament, which
was a referendum proposing an advisory body to represent Indigenous communities.
In the end, the vote was majority.
Speaker 7 (07:50):
No.
Speaker 6 (07:51):
I don't believe in big government, big business, big unions
will make anything that monopolizes opportunity and stifle the potential
of the petole. For me, Conservatives are the real conservationists.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
It seems like Allan himself was a fan of David's,
so much so that he turned up on the Conversations
with Conservatives broadcasts. In this video, they discussed presidential nominee
Donald Trump ahead of the twenty sixteen election.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
It'd have to be the most fascinating election that we've
seen in a long time, would you agree?
Speaker 6 (08:29):
I would, And if you read the and listen to
the mainstream media, you'd think the big issue was these
large number of ladies who are coming forward just before
the actual election. They were silent beforehand.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
Now, how world is it? Hangs on this that this
one problem that men actually like ladies.
Speaker 3 (08:57):
I contact David to ask him about Alan and I
Learne invested some money in Safeworlds. But he doesn't have
any hard feelings about what's happened. There's no guarantee in
these things. It would be foolish to believe that there is,
he tells me over a phone Call. David says he
started the Safeworld's broadcasts to give voice to conservatives who
(09:17):
he believes are no longer represented by the mainstream media,
and while only a few hundred people watched his videos,
he pulled in some big names. David managed to get
Family First Senator Bob Day on the program. Part of
a Christian right group loosely associated with the Pentecostal Church,
Bob Day is a climate change denier. Christian Democratic Party
(09:40):
leader Fred Nile was also a special guest on Safeworld's
Conversations with Conservatives. Fred Nile is opposed to abortion and
once said homosexuality was a mental disorder. Another guest was
Australia's richest person, Gene and Reinhart in August twenty sixteen.
Speaker 6 (09:57):
And our special guest today is missus gim Reinhart speaking
to us from Rio de Janeiro from the Olympic Games.
Speaker 8 (10:06):
Hello, missus Rehinhant, David, it's lovely to hear of you.
So should I start with my Thatcher quotes? She said
the problem with socialism is that you eventually run out
of other people's money. She also said, if you set
out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise
on anything at any time, and you would achieve nothing.
Speaker 3 (10:29):
Gina Reinhardt inherited a mining empire from her dad, Lang Hancock,
a man who once said that all Indigenous Australians should
be sterilized. It isn't his daughter Gina's view, but she's
been criticized for never publicly condemning his opinion. She's also
slammed what she calls climate change propaganda and has repeatedly
(10:50):
called for tax cuts and help for business. Gina Rehinhart
never got back to me when I asked her about
her connection to Safe Worlds. Someone else who declined to
talk to me about their appearance on Safeworld's TV was
Australia's most controversial politician, Pauline Hansen. Among other controversial opinions,
(11:10):
Pauline has called for a ban on the burker and
claimed her lull certified food funds terrorism. In twenty sixteen,
the year of her Safeworld's TV appearance, she called for
an outright stop on Muslim immigration to Australia.
Speaker 9 (11:25):
David Islam is for fortunate to be a religiou, yet
many people who are Muslims themselves say it is a
political ideology now what I'm saying is we need to
have a royal commission or an inquiry into is it
truly a religion or is a political ideology?
Speaker 3 (11:50):
To me, what she's saying there is ludicrous and offensive.
But it was broadcast through Safeworld's TV. So did Alan
condone it and did he ben his investors' money on
its promotion? The answer is quite likely yes. I find
a picture of Allan's son, Clayton metcalf editing this Pauline
(12:10):
Hanson video at their Gold Coast studios. Safewood's also posted
on social media about a town hall Pauline Hanson was
hosting in the lead up to the twenty fifteen Queensland
state election. So Allan was using his business as time,
resources and money on this money I can only assume
came from his investors. When I contact Pauline, she tells
(12:32):
me her involvement with Alan and Safefood's TV was a
long time ago and she'd have nothing to add. I've
dug up photos which show Alan and Mary standing side
by side with the controversial politician, so they at least
met her. That gets me thinking about what Leah, the
former FBI agent told me about political donations. Could Allan
(12:53):
have donated to the One Nation Party? If so, did
he do this using his money or his investors? Going online,
I searched the federal and Queensland transparency registers on the
Australian Electoral Commission and I can't find anything. Only donations
(13:14):
over fifteen thousand dollars are publicly listed. So that's not
a definite no, It's just that there's no evidence, but
there is evidence of Allan's spending money on politics indirectly.
Speaker 10 (13:28):
I am currently in Baltimore. On Monday, we will be
in Philadelphia. I expect that we will be heading home
sometime during the week of December ten.
Speaker 3 (13:39):
This is the AI program we've been using throughout the
series to recreate Alan's voice, reading out emails he's sent
while he was alive and which we've got hold of.
During this investigation, Alan was constantly traveling between Australia and
the US for business meetings and to run Safe World's
US office. In twenty twelve, Allan was in the for
(14:00):
most of the time, jetting to Washington, DC, California, Michigan, Minnesota, Maryland, Pennsylvania,
and Texas. Twenty twelve was also a presidential election year,
But back home in Australia, investors were growing concerned, like
Mike Brooke, the cybersecurity expert and blogger whose parents got
(14:22):
sucked into the scheme. Mike says, Alan was doing all
this traveling at a time when work on developing SAFELDS
itself seemed to have ground to a halt.
Speaker 11 (14:32):
It just doesn't make sense to have been able to
spend that much money when development stopped on the product.
The only place that could have been going was into
the travel, the worldwide travel that he was doing to
apparently sell his platform. Having this guy traveling around the
world trying to sell and build interest in this product,
(14:52):
That's not how you build interest in a product. You
have to be out with marketing and media. It just
seemed like it was a way to spend the last
years of your life actually out enjoying it.
Speaker 3 (15:05):
David Richardson is the Channel nine journalist from episode one
who came across Safeworld's TV a decade ago because his
mates were looking to invest.
Speaker 12 (15:13):
One of the things that bothered us certainly early on
in the piece was the number of times he was
flying back between America and Australia and American Australia, and
you know you could guarantee that he was flying. He
wasn't flying cattle class, so you know you're looking at
a fairly not cheap flights. I'd be sitting there with
my MD mates saying, what is he actually how much
(15:34):
money is he taking out of these investments, you know,
flying across the Pacific backwards and forwards and staying in
the hotels, And clearly he's not you know, he hasn't
lost any kilos, so he's clearly eating pretty well. So
I kept thinking to myself, there's money vanishing here for sure.
Speaker 3 (15:52):
Then there's Chris Lych. He's now retired in Perth, but
he used to work at a mind site near Geraldton
where he was introduced to Safe Worlds. Like hundreds of
others in Western Australia, Chris, his wife and son took
a leap of faith and invested twenty thousand dollars into
the scheme.
Speaker 13 (16:09):
I would say a lot of it was probably spent
by Alan Big noting himself while he was jet setting
all over the world.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
Chris is a former paramedic and nurse. He contacted me
through our tip inbox after the first few episodes of
this podcast went live.
Speaker 13 (16:23):
The other, probably most obvious direction where the money could
have gone was the evangelical stuff and the promotion of
the GOP and the upcoming Trump candidacy.
Speaker 3 (16:34):
Wait a minute, what's this got to do with Trump?
I ask him. Chris read all of Alan's emails to
shareholders closely, and he still remembers some of them because
they made alarm belt ring for him.
Speaker 13 (16:46):
I got the impression the evangelical stuff started getting preached
a little bit more, and I thought, Oh, where's this
money going in? And I just sort no, I think
this has going down some kind of an evangelical, ultra
far right wing sort of slot, and I didn't want
anything to do with it. And that really really sort
of started making me question, what the hell have I
gotten into here.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
Chris's family stopped investing.
Speaker 13 (17:09):
We're definitely not conservative or right wing in any way.
We're more progressive. I suppose we don't believe in any of
the old conservative sort of politics at all, so we
would have probably run a mile from it.
Speaker 3 (17:21):
So I go back to those old emails Allan sent
to his investors. This time I look for references to
US politics, and I find them. Alan was a devoted
follower of x US President Donald Trump. Here's Ai Allan
reading out one of these emails.
Speaker 10 (17:38):
The election of Donald Trump is good news for public
listing and IPO in America. Financial investment regulations have seriously
shackled businesses in the US and made stock market listing
less attractive under President Obama.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
An IPO means initial public offering, which is financial jargon
for a company floating on the stock market.
Speaker 10 (18:04):
I am therefore very bullish about the US economy in
the next twelve months. After that depends on what Trump
does in twenty seventeen. A lot can and should happen.
Best wishes for a great twenty seventeen for us all
we have certainly earned it.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
Twenty seventeen was Trump's first year as US president, but
as we know, twenty seventeen was not a great year
for Alan. That was the year he died, and also
the year police raided Safe Worlds and the company got
in trouble from the Australian regulator. Just a month before
his death, though, Alan was still busy trying to make
(18:44):
his grand dreams for Safe Worlds a reality, and it
seems that Trump was part of how we hoped to
do that.
Speaker 14 (18:51):
The purpose of this video is to advise key decision
makers in the Trump administration that I made the ESSENTI
shall break through discovery of how human intelligence and therefore
true AI works in nineteen ninety nine. If America embraces
(19:11):
this technology, the American dream of life, liberty, and the
pursuit of personal happiness can be given to the world
to enshrine the American dream forever.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
This seems wildly ambitious and maybe egotistical, the idea that
this slightly crappy YouTube video would influence the White House
and bring happiness to the entire world. But being Allan,
he wasn't just going to sit idly by and hope
that Trump would stumble across his work. He was actively
trying to strike a deal. This is Ai Allan again,
(19:47):
reading out an email he's sent to investors in January
twenty seventeen.
Speaker 10 (19:51):
We are talking with Phonoscope in Houston, Texas about a
joint approach to the Trump administration on privacy and security.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
Phonoscope is a major telco company in Houston, one of
the biggest cities in Texas, which is a very Republican
US state, and the Republicans of the Party of Donald Trump.
Speaker 10 (20:11):
We reached the basis of an agreement with Phonoscope. Basically,
the deal will involve Phonoscope becoming our super distributor for
the US. They will provide pre IPO and IPO funding assistance.
The big plus with our vision is that we are
now dealing with the owner. He now shares our vision.
Speaker 3 (20:33):
Phonoscope and its chief exec Lee Cook, never answered my questions,
so I keep looking. Phonoscopes made a few minor political
donations to Texas Republican candidates over the years, and Lee
Cook has personally donated more than eighty five thousand into
Republican causes. I keep going back through Allen's emails and
(20:53):
uncover that Phonoscope had a relationship with Safeworlds going back
five years.
Speaker 10 (20:59):
Phonoscope is working with us to establish the Tea Party
Network in America. They have agreed to provide their large
meeting room that holds about sixty people for the inaugural
meeting of the Tea Party Network in Houston on January
twenty four, twenty thirteen.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
Okay, this is big. The Tea Party were a hand
grenade thrown into US politics. Its name comes from one
of the sparks that lit the American War of Independence,
where British rulers were overthrown. Bizarrely, that spark was a
protest against the laws on taxes. In seventeen seventy three,
American patriots boarded British ships carrying tea and threw their
(21:40):
loads into Boston Harbor. The more modern Tea Party movement
spawned in two thousand and nine. They started and then
fueled the baseless racist conspiracy theory that Obama was secretly
a foreign born Muslim and therefore not allowed to be president.
Another memorable moment for the Tea Party was when one
of the and it's stay endorsed set in a debate
(22:02):
about abortion. If it's a legitimate rape, the female body
has ways to shut that whole thing down, and the
Tea Party had an impact.
Speaker 15 (22:11):
It may be the biggest political movement in years, Thousands
upon thousands of Americans gathering in cities across the country,
inventing their anger and demanding change. It is, of course,
the Tea Party, and while it may be growing, it's
still not exactly clear who they are or what impact
they'll have on the midterm elections.
Speaker 16 (22:27):
Tea Party supporters were once considered to be on the
fringe of the Republican Party, but now the group may
be driving the force in the midterm elections. According to
a Bloomberg national poll, thirty three percent of likely voters
are aligned with the Tea Party.
Speaker 17 (22:41):
I think it's gonna be the best political story to
watch in the coming year.
Speaker 18 (22:44):
There's a lot of energy and it's really.
Speaker 19 (22:46):
Remarkable in some polls, I'm not sure you should trust them,
say more people identifying themselves as Tea Party people than
Republican issue.
Speaker 1 (22:52):
The media got this one hundred percent wrong, right.
Speaker 11 (22:54):
This is not miners versus Tea Party. The Tea Party
has taken over the entire Republican Ay don't you agree?
Speaker 3 (23:01):
And does that matter to this story? Well, yes, because
Alan Metcalf claimed he was there at the center of
it all, going to these Tea Party meetings along with
his technology. Alan told investors that Safefolds and Phonoscope.
Speaker 10 (23:16):
Would provide assistance to the American Tea Party network. Across America.
About fifty Tea Party groups have indicated their interest to
start building their community channels as soon as they get
the software. Some of the groups will lead us into
other groups. At this point, I believe we have most
(23:38):
of the key groups representing the Tea Party in America.
Speaker 3 (23:43):
Here's another of Allan's emails.
Speaker 10 (23:45):
Tomorrow I fly to Michigan for a week of talks
with the Michigan Tea Party movement about their interest in
using Safe World's TV to provide a local information service
about the Tea Party throughout the state of Michigan.
Speaker 3 (24:01):
Allan was also editing videos of Sarah Palin for the
Safe World's channel. She's a Republican presidential nominee and was
called one of the figureheads of the Tea Party movement,
and he did the same with Mike Pence, who went
on to become Trump's vice president. There's also a photo
of Alan in Dallas next to John Tweedle, a Texas
Tea Party leader. He also claimed he was in discussions
(24:25):
with a conservative think tank called the Atlas Network in Washington,
DC about another possible Safe Worlds deal. The Atlas Network
has since been exposed as receiving funding from the Koch Brothers,
who were one of the biggest drivers behind the Tea
Party movement. Alan also claimed he met Ron Paul on
his travels, a hardcore right wing politician from Texas who's
(24:48):
tried to run as president three times for the Republicans.
Ron Paul is so conservative that he refuses to travel
alone with a woman unless it's his wife.
Speaker 20 (25:03):
Supporters of Congressman Ron Paul back in December two thousand
and seven, celebrating the two hundred and thirty fourth anniversary
of the Boston Tea Party with rallies across the nation
and an online money bomb that raised millions of dollars
for Ron Paul's presidential bid in two thousand and eight.
Speaker 16 (25:20):
Rod Paul, Ron Paul, the guy pulled in six million
dollars yesterday, probably the largest single day political fundraising total
in US history.
Speaker 21 (25:27):
Who's the father of the Tea Party? It's Ron Paul.
This is the age of Ron Paul.
Speaker 3 (25:32):
I contact Ron Paul to ask if he'd ever met Allan.
He never responds. I know Allan was prepared to promote
the views of those he agreed with, and probably spent
Safe World's money to do it. I know he was
or wanted to be involved in Tea Party politics, which
helped reshape the US Republican Party, ultimately paving the way
(25:54):
for Trump, Who's standing for re election this November, is
it a leap to think Allan might have spent more
of his investors' money on political donations to Ron Paul's campaign,
or maybe even on Trump's. Like Australia, the US has
a register of political donations. I check and there wasn't
Alan Metcalf from Philadelphia who donated to political movements. But
(26:19):
he voted for the Democrat Party and was an architect.
So an Alan Metcalff, but not the Allan Metcalf. It
feels like another dead end. Then I wonder, am I
missing something? Are all political donations in the US really searchable?
And it turns out no, they're not. This is where
this story gets really shady. There's this phenomenon known as
(26:42):
dark money.
Speaker 18 (26:44):
People can contribute money to the political system without disclosing
who they are, and so that's dark money. There are
a lot of people who would like politicians to do
things that are not popular, that are not necessarily in
the public's interest, and they don't want to be seen.
So it's important to know who's helping people get away
because they are probably going to owe those people a favor.
Speaker 3 (27:03):
This is Russ Choma, an investigative reporter from US publication
Mother Jones based in Washington, DC. He speaks to me
on a video call after he's put his kids to bed,
lifting the lid on the sordid underbelly of American political donations.
Speaker 18 (27:20):
Corporations are allowed to give an unlimited amount of money
to these groups called super PACs, and immediately we had
the influx of these sort of anonymous corporations giving money
to the superPAC. It would just be a corporation set
up at a PO box in the middle of nowhere,
and all of a sudden, this corporation, which hadn't existed
three weeks before, had half a million dollars and it
was now free to spend it on the election. Another
(27:41):
route that quickly became obvious that people who didn't want
their identities closed was the use of nonprofits. When you
donate to a nonprofit of any kind in the United States,
you're allowed to be anonymous with your donations.
Speaker 3 (27:55):
Dark money has become huge in recent years. In the
two years leading up to the twenty twelve US election,
two billion dollars of dark money was spent mainly on
TV and online at I know Alan Metcalf could be
business savvy when it mattered, so I asked us whether
it would be possible for an Australian to try something
(28:17):
like this.
Speaker 18 (28:18):
The US law is very very clear you must be
a US citizen or a Green card holder to donate money.
But again we come back to this problem where if
you can donate money without revealing your identity, who knows
if you're American. And of course, of course there's money
coming from overseas, we have no idea if it's coming
from Australia, if it's coming from Russia, if it's coming
from elsewhere. So yeah, it is, I mean, it is
(28:40):
definitely a concern.
Speaker 3 (28:43):
What do you remember about the Tea Party's ability to
raise dark money?
Speaker 18 (28:47):
The Tea Party of one of the first examples of
dark money where money was coming into the system and
we didn't know why, and it was having powerful influence.
But the powerful influence they had was extremely disruptive and
really did change in a lot of ways the tone
of where the country was going. And I think it
was a precursor to a lot of the issues that
we currently have.
Speaker 3 (29:09):
Ron Paul had his own super pack called Endorsed Liberty,
and I find a picture online from twenty twelve showing
Alan at a convention hosted by another superpack called Freedom Works,
which was itself linked to the Tea Party. Alan was
photographed seated at a long table along with several other attendees.
(29:30):
Here's one of the campaign's Freedom Works spent its money.
Speaker 22 (29:33):
On influential conservative advocacy group in super pac Freedom Works
is under internal investigation. Among topics of the inquiry a
video produced under supervision of Freedom Works featuring a scene
of simulated sex with then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Two female interns were asked to act out a sex scene.
Most bizarrely, the scene itself apparently depicts an intern wearing
a panda suit simulating oral sex on another intern wearing
(29:54):
a Hillary Clinton mask.
Speaker 3 (29:56):
Freedom Works managed to raise twenty three million dollars the
year Allan attended the event ahead of the twenty twelve
US election. With all that money, it was hailed as
a major factor in turning Tea Party protesters into a
national political force. I ask the leaders of Freedom Works
if they ever worked with Alan. Frustratingly, they never respond,
(30:19):
and Freedom Works shut down earlier this year in May
twenty twenty four. It's another dead end, but not all
hope is lost. When I update Russ the American political
reporter where I'm ating my investigation. He tells me something else.
Speaker 18 (30:36):
A lot of the money involved with American politics is
a scam, which is probably a particular just to you
guys as well, A very very common thing in American
politics is they find someone who is rather naive, who
has a lot of money, who believes that if they
donate money, they'll get something, and then the money just
gets pocketed. We call these things scam packs. And the
hallmark of a scam pack is it raises, say a
million dollars saying that they are going to advocate for
(31:00):
the rights of elderly veterans, and the reason million dollars.
At the end of the day, they'll spend three thousand
dollars on supporting a political candidate. And it's just basically
a way to make money disappear. The people who run
these packs raise money and then just buy themselves a
fancy car or a house or something like that. There
is a distinct possibility that he was being scammed by
people who were not being honest themselves.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
In the case of Allan metcalf, Russ thinks it's entirely possible,
and I think so too. There would be a certain
poetic justice to it that Alan might have been conned
by another con artist. But beyond what I've done, it's
hard to know how I can look further into this.
And then Leo we TLTA, the ex FBI agent who's
(31:43):
been guiding me, comes up with a lead.
Speaker 4 (31:46):
One other thought is that he was very religious. I
would be interested to see did he give money to
charity or to his church or anything like that, because
that will typically move you up in the ranks of
an organization like that as well. So it kind of
becomes like a good way to hope money.
Speaker 3 (32:02):
And several shareholders also say this might be something worth
looking at.
Speaker 13 (32:07):
His religiosity was becoming more and more profound. I think
he was probably getting more comfortable with it.
Speaker 17 (32:13):
I think it maybe has gone into the church as
far as if Allan donated a lot of money to
a church or a religious organization. Now that I think
about it, it's quite possible because he was a man
of faith.
Speaker 3 (32:27):
So I go back to the beginning to Alan's funeral.
I tried contacting the bishop who led his church service,
Barry Cunnington.
Speaker 23 (32:36):
Alan was way above politics. Alan introduced me to safe
Well's television and for that time eternally grateful. Alan is
carrying a great gift, a gift that can bless the world,
and he's left that gift behind.
Speaker 3 (32:57):
Bishop Barry, who read that out as his eulogy to Alan,
is now a retired senior minister from the Tent of Promise.
It's a church in the Lockyer Valley outside Brisbane. Bishop
Barry was on the Safe World's advisory board, but he
claimed he never put any money into the Safe World's project.
Barry's Tent of Promised Church had its status as a
(33:18):
charity revoked because it failed to lodge financial reports two
years in a row, so I can't check its donation history,
though the bishop did tell me he never received a
donation from Allan or Safeworlds. We communicate over email. Here's
a voice actor reading out his words for your information.
Speaker 7 (33:37):
I first met mister Allan Metcalf through a friend who
introduced us at a church in Tweedhead's, New South Wales,
which I was pastoring. Mister Metcalf wanted to meet me
because he needed pastoral help. At that time. I also
met his wife, Mary Metcalf. I discovered that he and
his wife were in need of personal ministry support. I
had no prior knowledge of the Safe World's business venture
(33:57):
or the status of the business. Soon after that early
time of meeting mister and Missus Metcalfe, I received a
telephone call that Allan had passed away from heart failure,
sadly a common cause of death for those under extreme stress.
Mary Missus metcalf then asked me if I would be
prepared to serve her and her family in taking Allan's funeral,
which I did as a way of assisting her and
(34:18):
her family through the time of her grief. While there
is life, there is hope, and I'm aware that Missus
Mary Metcalfe is still occupied looking for a buyer. Safe
Worlds is a startup company and those investing were well
aware of that, knowing the risks. It reminds me of
a casino. Is it the builder and owner of the
casino or the gambler who is at fault? I say both.
Speaker 3 (34:40):
That brings me up short. Is it really fair to
call the investors in Safe Worlds gamblers? Yes, they lost
their money, but couldn't we call them victims? Or maybe
you could call them people of faith who believe what
Alan told them. That they were making a smart financial decision,
that Safe Worlds really would be bigger than Google. Allan
(35:03):
was also a man of faith, but he didn't seem
to be a regular church goer. Bishop Barry said they'd
only met a handful of times right near the end
of his life. Then I remember reading an email while
I was trawling through Allen's relationship with the Tea Party.
He said two church leaders were coming to these meetings
in the US with him.
Speaker 10 (35:23):
Doctor Ron Jensen, who has extensive connections with the Christian
Church and mission programs throughout America and the world, and
Nancy Houston Hanson from the Capstone Legacy Foundation will attend
this meeting to provide support.
Speaker 3 (35:39):
Nancy Hanson is the chief executive of Capstone Legacy Foundation,
a national nonprofit Christian organization based in Philadelphia. I can
see Nancy has made several personal donations to the Republican
Party over the years. Nancy and her group, Capstone Legacy Foundation,
don't respond to my questions. But then there's the other
(36:02):
person Alan mentioned in that email who was going to
these Tea Party catch ups with him, doctor Ron Jensen.
We actually heard from Ron in the very first episode
when he spoke at Alan's funeral.
Speaker 23 (36:13):
I truly believe he was a genius, and I trust
the history of books will prove that.
Speaker 9 (36:21):
To be the case.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
Ron is a Safe World shareholder and he was also
on the advisory board. But when I ask him, he
won't give me any information about these tea party meetings.
So I do some more digging. He says he's served
as the president of Campus Crusade's International Schools of Theology.
Campus Crusade is a megachurch originating from the US, but
(36:45):
also with influence in Australia and elsewhere all over the world.
Alan actually mentioned this church organization to Tarlie Joy Grace,
the Safewold's employee I met in episode three. She saw
Alan's Christian beliefs right up close.
Speaker 21 (37:01):
Alan was your really dodgy sort of Pendecostal. The thing
with Pendecostals is they really get caught up in hype
and your big fancy music and feel good talks, and
the biggest thing about them is prosperity doctrines. So basically,
if you give lots of money to the church, then
God will make you rich. And Alan in some ways
(37:23):
was a bit like that, except for US employees was
If you give all your time to me, to my business,
gold will make you rich. Alan claimed he was like
best mates with the founder of Campus Crusade for Christ
Bill Bright.
Speaker 3 (37:38):
Bill Bright was an evangelist who started Campus Crusade in
nineteen fifty two in part to combat communism. He was
also a staunch Republican. He died in two thousand and three,
but like Alan, he lives on eternally through the web.
Here he is to explain.
Speaker 19 (37:56):
Since eighteen forty four, I've had the privilege of bringing
a lot of happiness into this world by sharing the
Lord Jesus Christ the tens of thousands of students and
lay people around the world. We talk about chraze to
all who will listen. You have the privilege of participating
(38:17):
with our loving Lord in the fulfillment of his great
commission in this generation.
Speaker 3 (38:23):
The great commission is Christians carrying out Jesus's instruction to
spread the Word of God around the world. Bill Wright
certainly achieved this goal. His megachurch, now renamed to Crewe,
has a presence in more than two hundred countries, and
Alan seemed to have the same inner drive.
Speaker 10 (38:42):
In nineteen eighty nine, I first met the late doctor Bright,
and he told me about the Great Commission and said,
when you build that system, you must use it to
complete the Great Commission. I have been inspired to build
Safe Worlds for this purpose ever since. He said to me, Alan,
if God's hand is in your work, it will happen.
Speaker 3 (39:05):
So essentially, Alan had an ulterior motive for his whole
Safe World scheme. It wasn't just to create a new
tech company, but to help spread his beliefs. I wasn't
able to get anyone from the megachurch to talk to me.
But if what Alan's saying is true, then we really
do end up right where we started, with Alan talking
(39:26):
about Safe World's almost divine purpose. This is Mary, his wife,
speaking at his funeral, which you heard right back at
the beginning of episode one.
Speaker 24 (39:37):
I prayed to God when I was fifteen to send
me a husband who would be a kindred spirit, a
visionary who would not be afraid. God answered my prayers
in abundance to send me Alan Metcalf.
Speaker 3 (39:53):
Only from what I've found in this investigation, Alan's divine
purpose seemed to get mixed up with conservative policy spreading
the word of people like Pauline Hanson Gina Reinhardt, Ron Paul,
the Tea Party, and Donald Trump. If so, then yeah,
Alan really did do what he set out to with
(40:13):
Safe Worlds to change the world, but not in the
way anyone, including me and his hundreds of investors ever expected.
At least some of their money, the missing forty nine
million seems to have been spent building and promoting and
traveling to help establish a technology Alan used to benefit
(40:34):
those on the conservative extremes of Australian and US politics,
And maybe that's his legacy. By helping spread their message,
by working so closely with the Tea Party, by trying
to work with the first Trump administration, he helped in some
small way for what will happen this November, when Donald
(40:56):
Trump will stand again for election as US President, and
if he wins, will become the most powerful man on earth.
Is the final resting place of the missing forty nine million.
As simple and yet as crazy as that that one
Australian con man helped pave the way for Trump's rise
to power, or tried to.
Speaker 6 (41:18):
Let's see if this guy's got what he claims he's got.
Speaker 17 (41:22):
This could change the world. He claimed that it could
be the savior of the world if it all turned out.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
Right for him and for us.
Speaker 17 (41:29):
He was very protective of it. He always said, if
it got in the wrong hand, it could destroy the world.
Speaker 2 (41:35):
Safe world will change the world.
Speaker 10 (41:37):
Because it's the outsiders who changed the world, and it'll
make a real and lasting difference.
Speaker 3 (41:44):
I'm your host, Alex Turner Cohen and this was the
Missing forty nine million. Thanks for listening. Head to news
dot com dot to read more of my reporting on
this story. Do you know more? Get in touch through
(42:05):
our dedicated tip inbox Missing Millions at news dot com
dot au or contact me directly on Alex dot Turner
dash Cohen at news dot com, do a you or
look me up on Twitter to get my details. I'm
your host, Alex Turner Cohen. Nina Young is the executive producer,
sound design and editing by Tiffany Dimack. Our editorial director
(42:27):
is Dan Box. Grant McAvaney is our legal advisor, and
Kerry Warren is the editor of News dot com DODAU.
And thanks to our voice actor for this episode, Hunter Wardman,
Thank Heaven for the dreamers. Over the past century. They
have gone against the grain, flouted convention, disputed accepted truths,
marched to their own drummer, and in the process set
new benchmarks for human achievement. One such dreamer is computer
system designer Alan Metcalf. He dared to dream the impossible.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Safe world will change the world because it'll enable, for
the first time for us to take the whole world
economy into cyberspace.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
That was a commercial Allan and his teammate comparing himself
to people like Martin Luther King and Neil Armstrong. So
Alan clearly had a high opinion of himself. In fact,
it's his god complex that may help me finally solve
the mystery that I've been trying to answer since the
start of this series. What happened to the forty nine
(00:54):
million dollars of other people's money which went missing after
Alan died. I'm running out of time. It's my last
chance to find the missing millions in the next hour,
because this is the final episode. Let's finish what we started.
(01:16):
My investigation has taken me into the depths of Allan's past.
I've looked into whether Saffold's was or ever could be viable.
Then followed the money trail wherever it took me from
geraldon a sleepy town in country Australia to the billionaire's
playground of the Cayman Islands deep in the Caribbean Sea,
(01:39):
and of course explored whether he himself was really dead.
But there's one more possibility, and it's about to take
me into the world of national and international politics, from
Pauline Hansen to mega churches and Donald Trump, the former
US president who at the time we're making this might
(01:59):
very well will also be the next president of the
United States.
Speaker 4 (02:07):
I had a guy that was a CEO stealing from
my client, and he would steal money from my client,
put it in his bank account, and then he would
make donations to political parties. Now we have rules about
how much you can donate that are capped per individual,
but that's a whole other investigation is campaign financing.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
This is Leah Wheatolta, the ex FBI agent turned private
detective who gave me advice on how to follow a
money trail in episode six. Now Leah is telling me
this other ways people can funnel money through political donations.
Speaker 4 (02:47):
Any donations if they're in the States, any donations, if
you know who they donated to, you can pull those
reports and like their public record with the state and
so then you can run those and you can see
wine item names and how much they donated.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
Hang on. This is the first time I've considered this.
Up until this point, I've been focusing my efforts on
where the vanished money might have been stashed or what
Alan might have bought with it. But is it possible
the forty nine million dollars that hundreds of investors entrusted
to Alan might actually have been given away? I'm Alex
(03:26):
Turner Cohen, a finance and investigative reporter from news dot com.
Are you and you're listening to the Missing forty nine million?
This is the final episode False Profit.
Speaker 5 (03:50):
I've been involved in a few not for profit groups
which are in the political space, which is sort of
how I have that initial connection to Alan.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
This is Jaimar and Covids. We've briefly heard from him before.
He's a Safe Worlds investor who put ten thousand dollars
into the scheme. When I meet Ji in his Sydney office,
he helps me understand Alan's political views because he shares.
Speaker 5 (04:14):
Them our group is interested in preserving our status as
a constitutional monarchy.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
So a bit of history. The British invaded Australia two
hundred years ago and today it still has the British monarch.
Not everyone is happy about it. And back in nineteen
ninety nine there was a big push for Australia to
become a republic. There was a national referendum on the issue.
And Jai says his group, Australians for Constitutional Monarchy, campaign
(04:41):
to keep the royal family in power, and he says
this group was key to winning the debate.
Speaker 5 (04:47):
So since then we've sort of kept that group together.
There's been moments where people have still suggested change. There's
been nothing that's gained any meaningful traction, but that group
is still there to defend the status quo.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
Gai tells me. Alan was also a believer in the
status quo. In fact, according to a news article from
twenty fifteen, one of the main reasons Alan wanted to
get Safewold off the ground was to help what he
described as the prominently Christian middle class. Alan was able
to make quite an impression on Ji and his pro
monarchy group.
Speaker 5 (05:21):
It was clear that his overlapping views was quite consistent
with what we believe. It sort of inspired us, I guess,
to have a bit of confidence in what he was proposing,
and I think initially that's probably what allowed us to
give him the time of day. And then from there
I think, you know, we sort of learned a bit
more about him as a person, but also about the platform. Ultimately,
(05:44):
obviously the platform disappointed that's unfortunate, but initially we were
interested to explore it.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
Jai was convinced and put a small amount of cash
into Safe Worlds, but making money wasn't his main goal.
He saw the tech platform as a way to prom
his political ideals.
Speaker 5 (06:02):
My primary interest in it wasn't so much the return
on that investment, although I did definitely expect and hope
to see a return on it. More importantly, I wanted
to support the political objectives of the system.
Speaker 3 (06:16):
Jai had taken a gamble on Safe Worlds, and he
wasn't the only person in his group that got behind
the scheme. There was someone else in the picture, someone
who's kind of a big deal.
Speaker 5 (06:27):
So the two people who took the meeting with him
there was myself and David.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
Flint, Professor David Flint is a well known conservative columnist
now well into his seventies. Flint's always been a big
supporter of Alan Metcalf and his wife Mary. He was
on their advisory board and went on to launch his
own Safeworld's TV channel on YouTube. The video looks quite
amateur and David has a shock of white hair and
a distinctive voice.
Speaker 6 (06:53):
Hello, I'm David Flint. I'd like to tell you about
this program, Conversations with Conservatives. This is being broadcast in
audio and video via safe World's tvv.
Speaker 3 (07:06):
David isn't just a commentator, though, he has real influence
in the real world. During the twenty seventeen national vote
on whether to legalize same sex marriage, Flint called on
people to vote no because he said it was unconstitutional.
Speaker 6 (07:22):
For those who don't know me, I'm a conservative. What
this means to me is that I believe, in the
immortal words of the American founding fathers, that all men
and women have been endowed by their creator with certain
unlienable rights.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
Last year, Flint opposed Australia's Indigenous Voice to Parliament, which
was a referendum proposing an advisory body to represent Indigenous communities.
In the end, the vote was majority.
Speaker 7 (07:50):
No.
Speaker 6 (07:51):
I don't believe in big government, big business, big unions
will make anything that monopolizes opportunity and stifle the potential
of the petole. For me, Conservatives are the real conservationists.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
It seems like Allan himself was a fan of David's,
so much so that he turned up on the Conversations
with Conservatives broadcasts. In this video, they discussed presidential nominee
Donald Trump ahead of the twenty sixteen election.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
It'd have to be the most fascinating election that we've
seen in a long time, would you agree?
Speaker 6 (08:29):
I would, And if you read the and listen to
the mainstream media, you'd think the big issue was these
large number of ladies who are coming forward just before
the actual election. They were silent beforehand.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
Now, how world is it? Hangs on this that this
one problem that men actually like ladies.
Speaker 3 (08:57):
I contact David to ask him about Alan and I
Learne invested some money in Safeworlds. But he doesn't have
any hard feelings about what's happened. There's no guarantee in
these things. It would be foolish to believe that there is,
he tells me over a phone Call. David says he
started the Safeworld's broadcasts to give voice to conservatives who
(09:17):
he believes are no longer represented by the mainstream media,
and while only a few hundred people watched his videos,
he pulled in some big names. David managed to get
Family First Senator Bob Day on the program. Part of
a Christian right group loosely associated with the Pentecostal Church,
Bob Day is a climate change denier. Christian Democratic Party
(09:40):
leader Fred Nile was also a special guest on Safeworld's
Conversations with Conservatives. Fred Nile is opposed to abortion and
once said homosexuality was a mental disorder. Another guest was
Australia's richest person, Gene and Reinhart in August twenty sixteen.
Speaker 6 (09:57):
And our special guest today is missus gim Reinhart speaking
to us from Rio de Janeiro from the Olympic Games.
Speaker 8 (10:06):
Hello, missus Rehinhant, David, it's lovely to hear of you.
So should I start with my Thatcher quotes? She said
the problem with socialism is that you eventually run out
of other people's money. She also said, if you set
out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise
on anything at any time, and you would achieve nothing.
Speaker 3 (10:29):
Gina Reinhardt inherited a mining empire from her dad, Lang Hancock,
a man who once said that all Indigenous Australians should
be sterilized. It isn't his daughter Gina's view, but she's
been criticized for never publicly condemning his opinion. She's also
slammed what she calls climate change propaganda and has repeatedly
(10:50):
called for tax cuts and help for business. Gina Rehinhart
never got back to me when I asked her about
her connection to Safe Worlds. Someone else who declined to
talk to me about their appearance on Safeworld's TV was
Australia's most controversial politician, Pauline Hansen. Among other controversial opinions,
(11:10):
Pauline has called for a ban on the burker and
claimed her lull certified food funds terrorism. In twenty sixteen,
the year of her Safeworld's TV appearance, she called for
an outright stop on Muslim immigration to Australia.
Speaker 9 (11:25):
David Islam is for fortunate to be a religiou, yet
many people who are Muslims themselves say it is a
political ideology now what I'm saying is we need to
have a royal commission or an inquiry into is it
truly a religion or is a political ideology?
Speaker 3 (11:50):
To me, what she's saying there is ludicrous and offensive.
But it was broadcast through Safeworld's TV. So did Alan
condone it and did he ben his investors' money on
its promotion? The answer is quite likely yes. I find
a picture of Allan's son, Clayton metcalf editing this Pauline
(12:10):
Hanson video at their Gold Coast studios. Safewood's also posted
on social media about a town hall Pauline Hanson was
hosting in the lead up to the twenty fifteen Queensland
state election. So Allan was using his business as time,
resources and money on this money I can only assume
came from his investors. When I contact Pauline, she tells
(12:32):
me her involvement with Alan and Safefood's TV was a
long time ago and she'd have nothing to add. I've
dug up photos which show Alan and Mary standing side
by side with the controversial politician, so they at least
met her. That gets me thinking about what Leah, the
former FBI agent told me about political donations. Could Allan
(12:53):
have donated to the One Nation Party? If so, did
he do this using his money or his investors? Going online,
I searched the federal and Queensland transparency registers on the
Australian Electoral Commission and I can't find anything. Only donations
(13:14):
over fifteen thousand dollars are publicly listed. So that's not
a definite no, It's just that there's no evidence, but
there is evidence of Allan's spending money on politics indirectly.
Speaker 10 (13:28):
I am currently in Baltimore. On Monday, we will be
in Philadelphia. I expect that we will be heading home
sometime during the week of December ten.
Speaker 3 (13:39):
This is the AI program we've been using throughout the
series to recreate Alan's voice, reading out emails he's sent
while he was alive and which we've got hold of.
During this investigation, Alan was constantly traveling between Australia and
the US for business meetings and to run Safe World's
US office. In twenty twelve, Allan was in the for
(14:00):
most of the time, jetting to Washington, DC, California, Michigan, Minnesota, Maryland, Pennsylvania,
and Texas. Twenty twelve was also a presidential election year,
But back home in Australia, investors were growing concerned, like
Mike Brooke, the cybersecurity expert and blogger whose parents got
(14:22):
sucked into the scheme. Mike says, Alan was doing all
this traveling at a time when work on developing SAFELDS
itself seemed to have ground to a halt.
Speaker 11 (14:32):
It just doesn't make sense to have been able to
spend that much money when development stopped on the product.
The only place that could have been going was into
the travel, the worldwide travel that he was doing to
apparently sell his platform. Having this guy traveling around the
world trying to sell and build interest in this product,
(14:52):
That's not how you build interest in a product. You
have to be out with marketing and media. It just
seemed like it was a way to spend the last
years of your life actually out enjoying it.
Speaker 3 (15:05):
David Richardson is the Channel nine journalist from episode one
who came across Safeworld's TV a decade ago because his
mates were looking to invest.
Speaker 12 (15:13):
One of the things that bothered us certainly early on
in the piece was the number of times he was
flying back between America and Australia and American Australia, and
you know you could guarantee that he was flying. He
wasn't flying cattle class, so you know you're looking at
a fairly not cheap flights. I'd be sitting there with
my MD mates saying, what is he actually how much
(15:34):
money is he taking out of these investments, you know,
flying across the Pacific backwards and forwards and staying in
the hotels, And clearly he's not you know, he hasn't
lost any kilos, so he's clearly eating pretty well. So
I kept thinking to myself, there's money vanishing here for sure.
Speaker 3 (15:52):
Then there's Chris Lych. He's now retired in Perth, but
he used to work at a mind site near Geraldton
where he was introduced to Safe Worlds. Like hundreds of
others in Western Australia, Chris, his wife and son took
a leap of faith and invested twenty thousand dollars into
the scheme.
Speaker 13 (16:09):
I would say a lot of it was probably spent
by Alan Big noting himself while he was jet setting
all over the world.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
Chris is a former paramedic and nurse. He contacted me
through our tip inbox after the first few episodes of
this podcast went live.
Speaker 13 (16:23):
The other, probably most obvious direction where the money could
have gone was the evangelical stuff and the promotion of
the GOP and the upcoming Trump candidacy.
Speaker 3 (16:34):
Wait a minute, what's this got to do with Trump?
I ask him. Chris read all of Alan's emails to
shareholders closely, and he still remembers some of them because
they made alarm belt ring for him.
Speaker 13 (16:46):
I got the impression the evangelical stuff started getting preached
a little bit more, and I thought, Oh, where's this
money going in? And I just sort no, I think
this has going down some kind of an evangelical, ultra
far right wing sort of slot, and I didn't want
anything to do with it. And that really really sort
of started making me question, what the hell have I
gotten into here.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
Chris's family stopped investing.
Speaker 13 (17:09):
We're definitely not conservative or right wing in any way.
We're more progressive. I suppose we don't believe in any of
the old conservative sort of politics at all, so we
would have probably run a mile from it.
Speaker 3 (17:21):
So I go back to those old emails Allan sent
to his investors. This time I look for references to
US politics, and I find them. Alan was a devoted
follower of x US President Donald Trump. Here's Ai Allan
reading out one of these emails.
Speaker 10 (17:38):
The election of Donald Trump is good news for public
listing and IPO in America. Financial investment regulations have seriously
shackled businesses in the US and made stock market listing
less attractive under President Obama.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
An IPO means initial public offering, which is financial jargon
for a company floating on the stock market.
Speaker 10 (18:04):
I am therefore very bullish about the US economy in
the next twelve months. After that depends on what Trump
does in twenty seventeen. A lot can and should happen.
Best wishes for a great twenty seventeen for us all
we have certainly earned it.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
Twenty seventeen was Trump's first year as US president, but
as we know, twenty seventeen was not a great year
for Alan. That was the year he died, and also
the year police raided Safe Worlds and the company got
in trouble from the Australian regulator. Just a month before
his death, though, Alan was still busy trying to make
(18:44):
his grand dreams for Safe Worlds a reality, and it
seems that Trump was part of how we hoped to
do that.
Speaker 14 (18:51):
The purpose of this video is to advise key decision
makers in the Trump administration that I made the ESSENTI
shall break through discovery of how human intelligence and therefore
true AI works in nineteen ninety nine. If America embraces
(19:11):
this technology, the American dream of life, liberty, and the
pursuit of personal happiness can be given to the world
to enshrine the American dream forever.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
This seems wildly ambitious and maybe egotistical, the idea that
this slightly crappy YouTube video would influence the White House
and bring happiness to the entire world. But being Allan,
he wasn't just going to sit idly by and hope
that Trump would stumble across his work. He was actively
trying to strike a deal. This is Ai Allan again,
(19:47):
reading out an email he's sent to investors in January
twenty seventeen.
Speaker 10 (19:51):
We are talking with Phonoscope in Houston, Texas about a
joint approach to the Trump administration on privacy and security.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
Phonoscope is a major telco company in Houston, one of
the biggest cities in Texas, which is a very Republican
US state, and the Republicans of the Party of Donald Trump.
Speaker 10 (20:11):
We reached the basis of an agreement with Phonoscope. Basically,
the deal will involve Phonoscope becoming our super distributor for
the US. They will provide pre IPO and IPO funding assistance.
The big plus with our vision is that we are
now dealing with the owner. He now shares our vision.
Speaker 3 (20:33):
Phonoscope and its chief exec Lee Cook, never answered my questions,
so I keep looking. Phonoscopes made a few minor political
donations to Texas Republican candidates over the years, and Lee
Cook has personally donated more than eighty five thousand into
Republican causes. I keep going back through Allen's emails and
(20:53):
uncover that Phonoscope had a relationship with Safeworlds going back
five years.
Speaker 10 (20:59):
Phonoscope is working with us to establish the Tea Party
Network in America. They have agreed to provide their large
meeting room that holds about sixty people for the inaugural
meeting of the Tea Party Network in Houston on January
twenty four, twenty thirteen.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
Okay, this is big. The Tea Party were a hand
grenade thrown into US politics. Its name comes from one
of the sparks that lit the American War of Independence,
where British rulers were overthrown. Bizarrely, that spark was a
protest against the laws on taxes. In seventeen seventy three,
American patriots boarded British ships carrying tea and threw their
(21:40):
loads into Boston Harbor. The more modern Tea Party movement
spawned in two thousand and nine. They started and then
fueled the baseless racist conspiracy theory that Obama was secretly
a foreign born Muslim and therefore not allowed to be president.
Another memorable moment for the Tea Party was when one
of the and it's stay endorsed set in a debate
(22:02):
about abortion. If it's a legitimate rape, the female body
has ways to shut that whole thing down, and the
Tea Party had an impact.
Speaker 15 (22:11):
It may be the biggest political movement in years, Thousands
upon thousands of Americans gathering in cities across the country,
inventing their anger and demanding change. It is, of course,
the Tea Party, and while it may be growing, it's
still not exactly clear who they are or what impact
they'll have on the midterm elections.
Speaker 16 (22:27):
Tea Party supporters were once considered to be on the
fringe of the Republican Party, but now the group may
be driving the force in the midterm elections. According to
a Bloomberg national poll, thirty three percent of likely voters
are aligned with the Tea Party.
Speaker 17 (22:41):
I think it's gonna be the best political story to
watch in the coming year.
Speaker 18 (22:44):
There's a lot of energy and it's really.
Speaker 19 (22:46):
Remarkable in some polls, I'm not sure you should trust them,
say more people identifying themselves as Tea Party people than
Republican issue.
Speaker 1 (22:52):
The media got this one hundred percent wrong, right.
Speaker 11 (22:54):
This is not miners versus Tea Party. The Tea Party
has taken over the entire Republican Ay don't you agree?
Speaker 3 (23:01):
And does that matter to this story? Well, yes, because
Alan Metcalf claimed he was there at the center of
it all, going to these Tea Party meetings along with
his technology. Alan told investors that Safefolds and Phonoscope.
Speaker 10 (23:16):
Would provide assistance to the American Tea Party network. Across America.
About fifty Tea Party groups have indicated their interest to
start building their community channels as soon as they get
the software. Some of the groups will lead us into
other groups. At this point, I believe we have most
(23:38):
of the key groups representing the Tea Party in America.
Speaker 3 (23:43):
Here's another of Allan's emails.
Speaker 10 (23:45):
Tomorrow I fly to Michigan for a week of talks
with the Michigan Tea Party movement about their interest in
using Safe World's TV to provide a local information service
about the Tea Party throughout the state of Michigan.
Speaker 3 (24:01):
Allan was also editing videos of Sarah Palin for the
Safe World's channel. She's a Republican presidential nominee and was
called one of the figureheads of the Tea Party movement,
and he did the same with Mike Pence, who went
on to become Trump's vice president. There's also a photo
of Alan in Dallas next to John Tweedle, a Texas
Tea Party leader. He also claimed he was in discussions
(24:25):
with a conservative think tank called the Atlas Network in Washington,
DC about another possible Safe Worlds deal. The Atlas Network
has since been exposed as receiving funding from the Koch Brothers,
who were one of the biggest drivers behind the Tea
Party movement. Alan also claimed he met Ron Paul on
his travels, a hardcore right wing politician from Texas who's
(24:48):
tried to run as president three times for the Republicans.
Ron Paul is so conservative that he refuses to travel
alone with a woman unless it's his wife.
Speaker 20 (25:03):
Supporters of Congressman Ron Paul back in December two thousand
and seven, celebrating the two hundred and thirty fourth anniversary
of the Boston Tea Party with rallies across the nation
and an online money bomb that raised millions of dollars
for Ron Paul's presidential bid in two thousand and eight.
Speaker 16 (25:20):
Rod Paul, Ron Paul, the guy pulled in six million
dollars yesterday, probably the largest single day political fundraising total
in US history.
Speaker 21 (25:27):
Who's the father of the Tea Party? It's Ron Paul.
This is the age of Ron Paul.
Speaker 3 (25:32):
I contact Ron Paul to ask if he'd ever met Allan.
He never responds. I know Allan was prepared to promote
the views of those he agreed with, and probably spent
Safe World's money to do it. I know he was
or wanted to be involved in Tea Party politics, which
helped reshape the US Republican Party, ultimately paving the way
(25:54):
for Trump, Who's standing for re election this November, is
it a leap to think Allan might have spent more
of his investors' money on political donations to Ron Paul's campaign,
or maybe even on Trump's. Like Australia, the US has
a register of political donations. I check and there wasn't
Alan Metcalf from Philadelphia who donated to political movements. But
(26:19):
he voted for the Democrat Party and was an architect.
So an Alan Metcalff, but not the Allan Metcalf. It
feels like another dead end. Then I wonder, am I
missing something? Are all political donations in the US really searchable?
And it turns out no, they're not. This is where
this story gets really shady. There's this phenomenon known as
(26:42):
dark money.
Speaker 18 (26:44):
People can contribute money to the political system without disclosing
who they are, and so that's dark money. There are
a lot of people who would like politicians to do
things that are not popular, that are not necessarily in
the public's interest, and they don't want to be seen.
So it's important to know who's helping people get away
because they are probably going to owe those people a favor.
Speaker 3 (27:03):
This is Russ Choma, an investigative reporter from US publication
Mother Jones based in Washington, DC. He speaks to me
on a video call after he's put his kids to bed,
lifting the lid on the sordid underbelly of American political donations.
Speaker 18 (27:20):
Corporations are allowed to give an unlimited amount of money
to these groups called super PACs, and immediately we had
the influx of these sort of anonymous corporations giving money
to the superPAC. It would just be a corporation set
up at a PO box in the middle of nowhere,
and all of a sudden, this corporation, which hadn't existed
three weeks before, had half a million dollars and it
was now free to spend it on the election. Another
(27:41):
route that quickly became obvious that people who didn't want
their identities closed was the use of nonprofits. When you
donate to a nonprofit of any kind in the United States,
you're allowed to be anonymous with your donations.
Speaker 3 (27:55):
Dark money has become huge in recent years. In the
two years leading up to the twenty twelve US election,
two billion dollars of dark money was spent mainly on
TV and online at I know Alan Metcalf could be
business savvy when it mattered, so I asked us whether
it would be possible for an Australian to try something
(28:17):
like this.
Speaker 18 (28:18):
The US law is very very clear you must be
a US citizen or a Green card holder to donate money.
But again we come back to this problem where if
you can donate money without revealing your identity, who knows
if you're American. And of course, of course there's money
coming from overseas, we have no idea if it's coming
from Australia, if it's coming from Russia, if it's coming
from elsewhere. So yeah, it is, I mean, it is
(28:40):
definitely a concern.
Speaker 3 (28:43):
What do you remember about the Tea Party's ability to
raise dark money?
Speaker 18 (28:47):
The Tea Party of one of the first examples of
dark money where money was coming into the system and
we didn't know why, and it was having powerful influence.
But the powerful influence they had was extremely disruptive and
really did change in a lot of ways the tone
of where the country was going. And I think it
was a precursor to a lot of the issues that
we currently have.
Speaker 3 (29:09):
Ron Paul had his own super pack called Endorsed Liberty,
and I find a picture online from twenty twelve showing
Alan at a convention hosted by another superpack called Freedom Works,
which was itself linked to the Tea Party. Alan was
photographed seated at a long table along with several other attendees.
(29:30):
Here's one of the campaign's Freedom Works spent its money.
Speaker 22 (29:33):
On influential conservative advocacy group in super pac Freedom Works
is under internal investigation. Among topics of the inquiry a
video produced under supervision of Freedom Works featuring a scene
of simulated sex with then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Two female interns were asked to act out a sex scene.
Most bizarrely, the scene itself apparently depicts an intern wearing
a panda suit simulating oral sex on another intern wearing
(29:54):
a Hillary Clinton mask.
Speaker 3 (29:56):
Freedom Works managed to raise twenty three million dollars the
year Allan attended the event ahead of the twenty twelve
US election. With all that money, it was hailed as
a major factor in turning Tea Party protesters into a
national political force. I ask the leaders of Freedom Works
if they ever worked with Alan. Frustratingly, they never respond,
(30:19):
and Freedom Works shut down earlier this year in May
twenty twenty four. It's another dead end, but not all
hope is lost. When I update Russ the American political
reporter where I'm ating my investigation. He tells me something else.
Speaker 18 (30:36):
A lot of the money involved with American politics is
a scam, which is probably a particular just to you
guys as well, A very very common thing in American
politics is they find someone who is rather naive, who
has a lot of money, who believes that if they
donate money, they'll get something, and then the money just
gets pocketed. We call these things scam packs. And the
hallmark of a scam pack is it raises, say a
million dollars saying that they are going to advocate for
(31:00):
the rights of elderly veterans, and the reason million dollars.
At the end of the day, they'll spend three thousand
dollars on supporting a political candidate. And it's just basically
a way to make money disappear. The people who run
these packs raise money and then just buy themselves a
fancy car or a house or something like that. There
is a distinct possibility that he was being scammed by
people who were not being honest themselves.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
In the case of Allan metcalf, Russ thinks it's entirely possible,
and I think so too. There would be a certain
poetic justice to it that Alan might have been conned
by another con artist. But beyond what I've done, it's
hard to know how I can look further into this.
And then Leo we TLTA, the ex FBI agent who's
(31:43):
been guiding me, comes up with a lead.
Speaker 4 (31:46):
One other thought is that he was very religious. I
would be interested to see did he give money to
charity or to his church or anything like that, because
that will typically move you up in the ranks of
an organization like that as well. So it kind of
becomes like a good way to hope money.
Speaker 3 (32:02):
And several shareholders also say this might be something worth
looking at.
Speaker 13 (32:07):
His religiosity was becoming more and more profound. I think
he was probably getting more comfortable with it.
Speaker 17 (32:13):
I think it maybe has gone into the church as
far as if Allan donated a lot of money to
a church or a religious organization. Now that I think
about it, it's quite possible because he was a man
of faith.
Speaker 3 (32:27):
So I go back to the beginning to Alan's funeral.
I tried contacting the bishop who led his church service,
Barry Cunnington.
Speaker 23 (32:36):
Alan was way above politics. Alan introduced me to safe
Well's television and for that time eternally grateful. Alan is
carrying a great gift, a gift that can bless the world,
and he's left that gift behind.
Speaker 3 (32:57):
Bishop Barry, who read that out as his eulogy to Alan,
is now a retired senior minister from the Tent of Promise.
It's a church in the Lockyer Valley outside Brisbane. Bishop
Barry was on the Safe World's advisory board, but he
claimed he never put any money into the Safe World's project.
Barry's Tent of Promised Church had its status as a
(33:18):
charity revoked because it failed to lodge financial reports two
years in a row, so I can't check its donation history,
though the bishop did tell me he never received a
donation from Allan or Safeworlds. We communicate over email. Here's
a voice actor reading out his words for your information.
Speaker 7 (33:37):
I first met mister Allan Metcalf through a friend who
introduced us at a church in Tweedhead's, New South Wales,
which I was pastoring. Mister Metcalf wanted to meet me
because he needed pastoral help. At that time. I also
met his wife, Mary Metcalf. I discovered that he and
his wife were in need of personal ministry support. I
had no prior knowledge of the Safe World's business venture
(33:57):
or the status of the business. Soon after that early
time of meeting mister and Missus Metcalfe, I received a
telephone call that Allan had passed away from heart failure,
sadly a common cause of death for those under extreme stress.
Mary Missus metcalf then asked me if I would be
prepared to serve her and her family in taking Allan's funeral,
which I did as a way of assisting her and
(34:18):
her family through the time of her grief. While there
is life, there is hope, and I'm aware that Missus
Mary Metcalfe is still occupied looking for a buyer. Safe
Worlds is a startup company and those investing were well
aware of that, knowing the risks. It reminds me of
a casino. Is it the builder and owner of the
casino or the gambler who is at fault? I say both.
Speaker 3 (34:40):
That brings me up short. Is it really fair to
call the investors in Safe Worlds gamblers? Yes, they lost
their money, but couldn't we call them victims? Or maybe
you could call them people of faith who believe what
Alan told them. That they were making a smart financial decision,
that Safe Worlds really would be bigger than Google. Allan
(35:03):
was also a man of faith, but he didn't seem
to be a regular church goer. Bishop Barry said they'd
only met a handful of times right near the end
of his life. Then I remember reading an email while
I was trawling through Allen's relationship with the Tea Party.
He said two church leaders were coming to these meetings
in the US with him.
Speaker 10 (35:23):
Doctor Ron Jensen, who has extensive connections with the Christian
Church and mission programs throughout America and the world, and
Nancy Houston Hanson from the Capstone Legacy Foundation will attend
this meeting to provide support.
Speaker 3 (35:39):
Nancy Hanson is the chief executive of Capstone Legacy Foundation,
a national nonprofit Christian organization based in Philadelphia. I can
see Nancy has made several personal donations to the Republican
Party over the years. Nancy and her group, Capstone Legacy Foundation,
don't respond to my questions. But then there's the other
(36:02):
person Alan mentioned in that email who was going to
these Tea Party catch ups with him, doctor Ron Jensen.
We actually heard from Ron in the very first episode
when he spoke at Alan's funeral.
Speaker 23 (36:13):
I truly believe he was a genius, and I trust
the history of books will prove that.
Speaker 9 (36:21):
To be the case.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
Ron is a Safe World shareholder and he was also
on the advisory board. But when I ask him, he
won't give me any information about these tea party meetings.
So I do some more digging. He says he's served
as the president of Campus Crusade's International Schools of Theology.
Campus Crusade is a megachurch originating from the US, but
(36:45):
also with influence in Australia and elsewhere all over the world.
Alan actually mentioned this church organization to Tarlie Joy Grace,
the Safewold's employee I met in episode three. She saw
Alan's Christian beliefs right up close.
Speaker 21 (37:01):
Alan was your really dodgy sort of Pendecostal. The thing
with Pendecostals is they really get caught up in hype
and your big fancy music and feel good talks, and
the biggest thing about them is prosperity doctrines. So basically,
if you give lots of money to the church, then
God will make you rich. And Alan in some ways
(37:23):
was a bit like that, except for US employees was
If you give all your time to me, to my business,
gold will make you rich. Alan claimed he was like
best mates with the founder of Campus Crusade for Christ
Bill Bright.
Speaker 3 (37:38):
Bill Bright was an evangelist who started Campus Crusade in
nineteen fifty two in part to combat communism. He was
also a staunch Republican. He died in two thousand and three,
but like Alan, he lives on eternally through the web.
Here he is to explain.
Speaker 19 (37:56):
Since eighteen forty four, I've had the privilege of bringing
a lot of happiness into this world by sharing the
Lord Jesus Christ the tens of thousands of students and
lay people around the world. We talk about chraze to
all who will listen. You have the privilege of participating
(38:17):
with our loving Lord in the fulfillment of his great
commission in this generation.
Speaker 3 (38:23):
The great commission is Christians carrying out Jesus's instruction to
spread the Word of God around the world. Bill Wright
certainly achieved this goal. His megachurch, now renamed to Crewe,
has a presence in more than two hundred countries, and
Alan seemed to have the same inner drive.
Speaker 10 (38:42):
In nineteen eighty nine, I first met the late doctor Bright,
and he told me about the Great Commission and said,
when you build that system, you must use it to
complete the Great Commission. I have been inspired to build
Safe Worlds for this purpose ever since. He said to me, Alan,
if God's hand is in your work, it will happen.
Speaker 3 (39:05):
So essentially, Alan had an ulterior motive for his whole
Safe World scheme. It wasn't just to create a new
tech company, but to help spread his beliefs. I wasn't
able to get anyone from the megachurch to talk to me.
But if what Alan's saying is true, then we really
do end up right where we started, with Alan talking
(39:26):
about Safe World's almost divine purpose. This is Mary, his wife,
speaking at his funeral, which you heard right back at
the beginning of episode one.
Speaker 24 (39:37):
I prayed to God when I was fifteen to send
me a husband who would be a kindred spirit, a
visionary who would not be afraid. God answered my prayers
in abundance to send me Alan Metcalf.
Speaker 3 (39:53):
Only from what I've found in this investigation, Alan's divine
purpose seemed to get mixed up with conservative policy spreading
the word of people like Pauline Hanson Gina Reinhardt, Ron Paul,
the Tea Party, and Donald Trump. If so, then yeah,
Alan really did do what he set out to with
(40:13):
Safe Worlds to change the world, but not in the
way anyone, including me and his hundreds of investors ever expected.
At least some of their money, the missing forty nine
million seems to have been spent building and promoting and
traveling to help establish a technology Alan used to benefit
(40:34):
those on the conservative extremes of Australian and US politics,
And maybe that's his legacy. By helping spread their message,
by working so closely with the Tea Party, by trying
to work with the first Trump administration, he helped in some
small way for what will happen this November, when Donald
(40:56):
Trump will stand again for election as US President, and
if he wins, will become the most powerful man on earth.
Is the final resting place of the missing forty nine million.
As simple and yet as crazy as that that one
Australian con man helped pave the way for Trump's rise
to power, or tried to.
Speaker 6 (41:18):
Let's see if this guy's got what he claims he's got.
Speaker 17 (41:22):
This could change the world. He claimed that it could
be the savior of the world if it all turned out.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
Right for him and for us.
Speaker 17 (41:29):
He was very protective of it. He always said, if
it got in the wrong hand, it could destroy the world.
Speaker 2 (41:35):
Safe world will change the world.
Speaker 10 (41:37):
Because it's the outsiders who changed the world, and it'll
make a real and lasting difference.
Speaker 3 (41:44):
I'm your host, Alex Turner Cohen and this was the
Missing forty nine million. Thanks for listening. Head to news
dot com dot to read more of my reporting on
this story. Do you know more? Get in touch through
(42:05):
our dedicated tip inbox Missing Millions at news dot com
dot au or contact me directly on Alex dot Turner
dash Cohen at news dot com, do a you or
look me up on Twitter to get my details. I'm
your host, Alex Turner Cohen. Nina Young is the executive producer,
sound design and editing by Tiffany Dimack. Our editorial director
(42:27):
is Dan Box. Grant McAvaney is our legal advisor, and
Kerry Warren is the editor of News dot com DODAU.
And thanks to our voice actor for this episode, Hunter Wardman,
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