REPLAY - Episode 13 - Melissa Caddick

0:16 Welcome back everybody to episode 13 of Two Crime Besties.

0:21 Welcome everyone, I'm so excited to be here for another week.

0:24 So am I. It's, it's very exciting.

0:26 We've got our new equipment. We've got, if you're watching on

0:29 Spotify or YouTube, we've actually got some little

0:32 backdrops now. I feel like every week we're

0:35 kind of getting a little bit, you know, more professional and

0:37 whatnot. As long as they stay up.

0:39 Yeah, well, we'll see. We'll.

0:41 See, we might have to get invested in the stands next.

0:43 I think so. Whatever happens happens.

0:45 But yeah, they're they're cool for now.

0:48 How's your week been? Yeah, yeah, pretty good week,

0:50 not too bad. It's been a busy one of as

0:53 usual, running around after kids and Yep, keeping me very busy

0:57 actually. But.

0:57 Yeah, I've been really enjoying watching the Olympics.

1:00 Loving watching the Olympics and my kids are way into it.

1:04 Yeah, yes, yeah, I'm very well. I mean, because Australia is

1:07 doing so well this year too, like better than they've ever

1:10 done before with gold medal tellies and stuff, that it's

1:12 like, I think it's just making it even more exciting.

1:13 And yeah. And every every morning you wake

1:15 up and there's a new gold medal to add to.

1:17 Telly And how's the little go getter?

1:19 The 14 year old skateboarder Arissa True.

1:21 Holy cow, believable. That's if she's.

1:24 Such a gorgeous kid, like to be 14 and being interviewed by the

1:28 world's media and to come across so amazingly, just she's

1:33 incredible. Well, I got to like, have a bit

1:35 of reminiscent from my like, younger, younger days.

1:38 And I was able to say to the boys, you know, that because I

1:39 think it was on Instagram that Tony Hawk shared, yeah, her win.

1:43 And I'm like, well, Tony Hawk's like more my era.

1:47 And so I'm like, then I'm showing the boys like Tony Hawk

1:49 videos of him doing his stuff. And they were, they were blown

1:51 away by him. And I'm like, well, Tony Hawk

1:53 will say Arisa True is better than him even now.

1:56 Yeah. He does and.

1:57 Then she's flicking. 1414 Speaking of Tony Hawk, when we

2:01 were kids, my brother and I used to play Tony Hawk on the

2:03 Nintendo 64. It was the best, yeah, but my

2:06 brother, you'd would turn the Nintendo off because I was

2:10 better at it than him. And if I got a higher score,

2:12 he'd literally turned them into score.

2:15 And I'm still not over at 25. 30 years later.

2:18 So today we are talking about none other than Melissa Kadik.

2:24 So she she's a this is a really interesting story with a couple

2:28 of very interesting characters, most notably her second husband,

2:33 Tony Coletti. Anthony Coletti.

2:35 We will get back. We will get to him.

2:37 Yeah, as the episode goes on. But stay tuned, guys.

2:41 Oh yeah. Yeah, that's so good.

2:45 So good. So Melissa Kadik, born Melissa

2:50 Grimley. She was born in Sydney in New

2:53 South Wales in Australia on the 21st of April in 1971.

2:58 She was born into a very sort of middle class, normal Australian

3:04 family, had a pretty typical upbringing from everything I've

3:07 been able to hear. Yeah, her family seem lovely.

3:10 Yeah, her mum and dad, hard working people.

3:14 She's got a brother who has really stuck by her throughout

3:17 this entire ordeal, even though, you know, he was actually one of

3:21 her victims in the. End impacted by this.

3:23 Yeah, yeah. So Melissa was, AI guess, a

3:28 self-proclaimed. Businesswoman very much so

3:33 self-proclaimed. I mean she from workout she

3:35 finished school and went and she didn't do great at school.

3:38 She didn't do poor at school like.

3:40 I actually think she didn't do very well at school.

3:43 Like from yeah, from one of the podcasts I was listening to.

3:46 There's a really good podcast about this, this case called

3:48 Liar Liar Yeah, go and check it out if you want a long form

3:52 podcast about this case. And and goes into really

3:55 intricate detail. But apparently she used to do

3:58 like what is known as. It sounds horrible.

4:01 But veggie math, I did veggie math.

4:03 That's what I did too. You had to do a math subject to

4:05 get into, like into education. Yeah.

4:08 And so I had, I did veggie math 'cause I suck at maths.

4:10 But yeah, oh, surprise, surprise, later on, got, you

4:12 know, diagnosed with dyslexia. Like, of course, it wasn't great

4:16 at maths. Derpies.

4:17 Yeah. It's only you've known sooner.

4:20 If only that's why veggie maths was my perfect subject.

4:23 Well, I I don't even think it was a perfect subject for

4:26 Melissa because I don't think she did.

4:27 Yeah, I think she did really, like, she really struggled with

4:30 it from all accounts. So she's.

4:34 Finance, sorry. Well, she didn't, actually.

4:37 She kind of fell into finance though, didn't she?

4:39 In a way. Yeah, yeah, because.

4:41 She basically, I mean, she after school, I think she aspired to

4:47 go to university for her. The way her life was perceived

4:51 by other people was really important, even from back when

4:55 she was, you know, really, really young.

4:57 So after school, after high school, she actually went to, it

5:01 was called Patrick's College. And it wasn't a university, it

5:05 was just a well, she ended up doing a secretary and business

5:09 admin course there. Yeah.

5:11 Yeah. That like that kind of led into

5:13 to her first, her first job. But even from that start, she

5:19 was lying on her resume. Yeah.

5:20 Yeah, well, I think I, I'm not sure if did she lie on her first

5:24 first job because she was employed originally as an office

5:27 administrator. So I don't know that she would

5:29 have had to have lied to get that job given.

5:31 Probably not the. Course at Patrick's College that

5:34 she did, yeah. However, pretty much every job

5:37 she had subsequently, yes, she lied.

5:40 She lied about. So she worked for NRMA in their

5:44 investment division as an office, office admin type type

5:48 role. She'd be getting coffees.

5:49 She'd be like, you know, inputting data.

5:52 I can't see it. And I think she'd take like

5:54 minutes of meetings and that kind of thing.

5:56 So I guess she was Privy to some information during that time.

5:59 And then there was a boutique investment bank and the guy, I

6:03 think, who started that bank wanted to groom someone to sort

6:08 of get somebody on board to kind of help build his business and

6:13 somebody he could kind of mentor and grow.

6:16 In order to get that role, though, she lied, yes.

6:20 So this was the start of known documented lying.

6:25 In this case, on her resume she put fictitious qualifications

6:30 including a degree from finance from Sydney from the University

6:34 of Technology in Sydney. It later came out when the

6:38 University was was approached to find out whether or not she

6:42 actually held this qualification.

6:44 Their comment was there is no record of completion of a

6:50 diploma in finance or a Master's in business or finance or any

6:54 qualification under the name Melissa Kadik or Grimly.

6:59 Yeah, never attended, never even applied.

7:02 No, no record of her whatsoever. No record of her.

7:06 Yeah. So in 1998, six months after

7:11 starting at this boutique investment bank, which actually

7:14 just real quick, what's a boutique investment bank and how

7:18 can I get in? It sounds nice.

7:21 Yeah, so she six months after starting there, they actually

7:28 found out that they discovered that she'd stolen about $2000 by

7:33 forging her boss's signature on on checks.

7:37 And they found it out because I think this there was a branch in

7:41 Perth and a branch in New South Wales.

7:44 And there was some discrepancy when they were balancing the

7:46 books and the owner of the business went down to the bank

7:50 so that he could actually see, physically see the checks.

7:53 And he looks at the signature on them and he's like, that's not

7:55 my. Signature.

7:56 Not even close. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

7:58 Like, you think she'd see his signature and at least try and

8:01 copy it, but apparently it wasn't even like it was real

8:03 really obvious that it wasn't his.

8:05 Yeah. She was like skimming off the

8:06 top, basically just stealing money from the company.

8:08 Yeah. So in this instance it was to

8:10 the tune of around 2000 Australian dollars, so not a

8:13 lot. So not a lot.

8:14 So he said to her, I you can either leave and leave quietly

8:19 and without consequence or I'm going to call the police.

8:22 And she chose to leave. Now had they prosecuted her at

8:27 the time, do you think the outcome would have been any

8:29 different? Yeah, I think that maybe, look,

8:33 she was prolific in what she ended up doing and I think she

8:36 would have tried to find ways, but maybe, maybe, maybe there

8:39 was would be some record then of who of things that she'd done in

8:42 the past and therefore she couldn't have maybe got as far

8:45 as she did. Yeah, yeah, that's what I think.

8:48 I think she still would have tried it on.

8:51 Yeah, but agreed, I think maybe it would have put a little flag

8:56 up when she was, you know, I don't know when she was starting

8:59 to be investigated maybe and was like and they could go back and

9:02 go oh, right in 19. 98 being prosecuted.

9:04 Yeah, or even just a red flag of some.

9:06 Even if she wasn't prosecuted, I don't know if that would have

9:09 made a difference, but you know, we'll never know.

9:12 Yeah. So yeah, she forged 4 checks to

9:15 the tune of of the $2000. So yeah, I'm sure if she wasn't

9:20 caught, she would have just kept doing it.

9:21 Oh, absolutely. And look, and I the company not

9:24 doing anything further. I understand that.

9:25 How much easier for them to deal with it.

9:27 Just go, hey, you're done here. Off you go.

9:29 Like, I mean, to go through actually, you know, filing the

9:32 full, you know, and trying to charge her or whatever with this

9:35 would have been a nightmare for the company a bit.

9:37 So don't blame them for it. Yeah, but it has meant that

9:40 she's been pretty much gone. Right.

9:41 Well, OK, I've learned something and I'll adapt.

9:44 And this is how I'm going to get around to this next time.

9:46 Yeah. She was then hired as a

9:48 financial advisor. Sorry, this is the company that

9:50 she was looking to be groomed to become a financial advisor

9:54 through. Sorry that wasn't sorry at the

9:57 boutique investment bank. She was hired as office

9:59 administrator as. Well, sorry, but then the next

10:01 job, then she again lied on her resume, yes, saying that at the

10:04 previous company where she was literally just administratively

10:07 really, Yeah, they were wanting to help groom her and, you know,

10:10 teach her and things. But she in on her resume put

10:13 that basically she was managing billion dollar accounts.

10:16 Literally with AB, yeah. Yeah.

10:19 Which was she was, I think she said that she was managing in

10:22 Rmas like international investments or something.

10:25 Yes, Yeah. So she was hired as a financial

10:30 advisor then for Wise Financial Services.

10:33 They were a subsidiary of ING. Yes, a really large corporation.

10:39 And was this the one that she like basically became a small

10:43 owner of? So she.

10:44 She invested small. Well, I guess so.

10:47 She borrowed 750,000 Australian dollars to buy a 25% stake in

10:52 the business. Yeah.

10:53 So I mean what's that valued at $3,000,000?

10:57 The business, she, I I guess they must have seen some

11:01 potential in her. By all accounts, the even though

11:06 the owner of that business decided that he didn't want his

11:11 name out there, he has made statements around her employment

11:15 at at the time. And he did say that she was very

11:18 personable. She was wonderful with the

11:20 clients. She was very well liked by

11:23 everybody. Yeah, she was clearly grooming

11:26 people or she was gaining some some knowledge.

11:29 I mean, she was very, very and manipulative, yeah.

11:33 So she so, yeah. So I've written in my notes here

11:36 that by 2003 she was very well regarded in the industry and she

11:41 featured on the cover of the Independent Financial Advisor.

11:45 Yep, the first of two features. Oh yeah.

11:48 I didn't know there was 2. Only Oh yeah, the other one was

11:50 after. She was after, yeah.

11:53 We normally not so, yeah, yeah, right.

11:55 So one's like, you know? Looking pretty.

11:57 Good. Yeah, the other.

11:58 One maybe not so bad. She fell out with Wise

12:02 Investments when the company refused to allow her to

12:05 recommend property and shares to her clients.

12:09 Yeah, she was basically going beyond her scope.

12:13 Scope of which her job. Was against regulatory

12:15 compliance rules at the time and I believe still is still.

12:18 Yeah. So she basically left there in

12:23 December of 2004 and she left with her $750,000 investment.

12:29 They gave that back to. Her as well.

12:30 I'm like yeah, that's right. It's how much they wanted her

12:32 out and. Yeah, they paid her back with no

12:34 interest. No, like literally just gave her

12:36 the money she'd invested into the company.

12:38 Yeah. And went haha, see you later.

12:40 She claimed to her friends. Now, this is where the con

12:44 really, really started, because she claimed to her family and

12:48 friends that she received that she was involved.

12:51 Actually there there are several stories.

12:53 Yeah, she changed her story for everyone.

12:54 Yeah. The main story is, or the most

12:56 commonly told story was that she, during her time at Wise,

13:01 she developed a piece of software with a few other people

13:04 that superannuation funds purchased and that she was paid

13:11 $86 million as a result of generating this piece of

13:17 software, $86 million. Oh my God and that she wasn't

13:22 allowed to work in the industry for 10 years.

13:23 She signed a non compete. For five years, I think it was a

13:25 non compete. For five years, I read.

13:27 Oh, OK, I read 10, but yeah, regardless, there was there was

13:30 a period of time where she wasn't supposed to be trading.

13:33 Yeah, yeah. She also claimed that she got

13:36 that money from the company because of a sexual harassment.

13:40 Claim Yeah, who's paying out 86 mil for a sexual harassment plan

13:44 that claim? No one.

13:46 But but so she was telling her friends and family this and they

13:49 didn't question her. They believed what she said.

13:52 Yeah, yeah, yeah. She just went out like she would

13:55 just spin everything. And I'm.

13:57 I'm guessing she targeted who she changed her story for to

14:01 she. Definitely, definitely did what?

14:02 Would get that person more empathy, like for her, like.

14:05 It was really interesting, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

14:09 So, I mean, she then went on to start her own company, company

14:16 called Maliva or Maliva, I've heard it.

14:20 I've heard it. I've had it both ways.

14:21 Yeah, yeah. We've always got something in

14:23 these episodes that we're not quite sure how to pronounce.

14:25 Get my tongue around, yeah. And she started to rein in her

14:28 friends, so she offered. I mean, I guess people kind of

14:32 conned into giving their money to her because she was like,

14:36 look, I'm just doing this for family and friends.

14:38 I'm only taking on a few clients.

14:40 And I've got a spot, a spot available just now just for you.

14:44 So if you if you invest with me. And so people felt pressured for

14:48 sure. Well.

14:49 She, I mean, she started out her first target was her lifelong

14:52 friend who and the way she sort of got her and was like, oh,

14:55 we're, we're both now single mothers and I'm investing my

14:58 money. I could just do it for you at

15:00 the same time. And we could both benefit from

15:02 this, you know, and because that's where my skill set is.

15:05 It's like, you know, trying to bond with someone over that

15:07 genuine, you know, common ground and then using that to her

15:11 benefit to do over her best friend.

15:15 Yeah, yeah, I just. That's gets me.

15:18 Yeah. Yeah.

15:18 But yeah, she very much was like, I've only got 15 spots.

15:22 I only ever take 15 clients at a time.

15:24 Bullshit. Like she ended up with 60

15:27 clients at the moment at any at her peak.

15:30 Yeah. You know, some of them did pull

15:32 their money out at times. What?

15:34 And, you know, but then she'd quickly replaced them,

15:36 obviously, because she's got to get the money coming in.

15:39 Yeah, and what was she getting the money coming in for?

15:40 She wasn't investing people's money, she was spending it.

15:44 And I mean every all to. Explain I guess for our

15:47 international listeners to what a superannuation fund is, I

15:50 guess because it's very it's fairly Australian base that

15:52 basically it's it's a fund where we put money in our employers

15:55 contribute to these funds so that we have retirement money.

15:59 So instead of necessarily relying entirely on government

16:01 funds, at the end of your working life you have a bucket

16:05 of money that. Yeah.

16:06 I think the equivalent in America is a 401401K.

16:09 Yeah. I'm not sure what the equivalent

16:11 in Europe or Asia is or whether there even is 1, but it is

16:14 basically, yeah, money for your retirement.

16:16 Yeah, yeah. And so there's different ways in

16:18 Australia where you can how you can invest that.

16:20 So most people use like funds that are set up, some of them

16:25 are like industry specific and things like that.

16:28 You can choose how, which, which fund you go with and they all

16:31 invest in various ways. Or another way of going about it

16:34 is doing a self managed Superfund, which is what Melissa

16:38 Kadik was basically saying that she was able to do for these

16:41 people, is take your money out of that company's fund, give it

16:46 to me and I'll invest it for you in whatever various ways to make

16:51 the. Money.

16:52 So she was saying that she was getting far greater returns on

16:56 the investments than the stock standard investment funds or

16:59 superannuation funds that people had their money in.

17:02 So. And it's quite regulated in

17:04 terms of taking money out of super funds.

17:06 Like it's, it is regulated that everyone must try and attempt to

17:09 have this money when you finish your working life, that it's not

17:12 a matter of, you know, or you can just freely take money out.

17:14 You've actually got to prove what you're going to do with

17:16 this money in a, in some sort of superannuation, in retirement

17:20 way. So you can invest in property or

17:21 shares, things like that. But it's regulated, yeah, even

17:25 under a super, even under a self managed situation.

17:27 That's it, Yeah. So Melissa was conning all of

17:32 her friends and family, so they're thinking she's got this

17:34 $886,000,000 windfall and she's doing this out of the kindness

17:37 of her own heart to help them build their portfolios and

17:40 wealth. Base already living like this

17:42 very lavish lifestyle and everyone was sort of querying

17:45 where this money could have come from that she was living like

17:46 that. Well, she hadn't.

17:48 Yeah, she had a story for where this money came from, but it

17:51 wasn't her money. It was their money that she was

17:54 spending. So this childhood friend of

17:56 hers, she conned her parents, her nephew, niece, sister, to

18:01 invest all of their money with her as well.

18:04 Yeah. And when they saw that they were

18:05 getting these incredible returns, they were not only

18:07 investing their superannuation, they were investing, like

18:10 putting extra of their money. Yeah.

18:12 Earnings into into her portfolio.

18:17 The accounts that she created through COMSEC.

18:20 So that's a trading account. They had 6 digits.

18:23 Turns out Comsec's actual accounts, trading accounts, have

18:27 8. No one picked up on that.

18:29 But I wouldn't. I would have no idea because she

18:31 would fraudulently. So monthly they would get these

18:33 statements from her that she just fraudulently created.

18:37 And yeah, and these digits at the top of the account number.

18:40 Now a COMSEC account typically is managed by the individual who

18:44 owns the account. So these people that she was

18:47 pulling in were not financially savvy people in that they, I

18:52 mean, I'm not a fully vouched to that.

18:54 I wouldn't know the first thing about what, how you manage these

18:56 things on your own. Yeah.

18:57 I mean, I've often said I'd love to put some money in shares, but

19:00 I'm scared, terrified of it. Like I don't know how to do

19:02 that. Yeah.

19:02 So they were basically relying on her to go, I know what I'm

19:05 doing, so I'll do it for you. They didn't know that these

19:08 Comsec accounts are not meant to be managed by the the financial

19:12 advisor. You as the that person can

19:14 direct where you send the money, but you're meant to be able to

19:17 have full access to that account and be able to enter like

19:19 literally login like you do to your bank account.

19:22 Check how your shares are doing on a daily basis if you wanted

19:24 to. That's not what she set up for

19:27 them. Like they couldn't access it.

19:29 They had to go via her to see what their shares were doing and

19:32 she was just creating these false documents.

19:34 That's because there was telling errors and everything, no?

19:37 Like, you think she'd have a bit of attention to detail because

19:40 by all accounts, she was a bit of a control freak as well.

19:42 Yeah, so. And she was very organized and

19:46 meticulous in the way she approached.

19:48 I'm going to say work, but it's not well, Yeah, her, her whole.

19:51 Wardrobe which I wanted to check out.

19:53 I know, like she had this, so she was spending everybody's

19:58 money. She was going on these lavish

19:59 holidays she had. So she had a home in Dover

20:04 Heights in Sydney, which is the second most expensive suburb in

20:09 Australia. Yeah.

20:11 The average house price there I think is something like $4.8

20:16 million. The average house price

20:18 Australia wide is somewhere like around the $1,000,000 mark 50 or

20:21 something, something like that. Yeah, but her house was actually

20:24 worth $6.2 million. What wasn't actually well, so

20:28 she it was actually she overpaid for that that property and which

20:32 again is her just like kind of going well, I can so I will.

20:35 Apparently she was looking at some property.

20:37 I don't think it was this particular one.

20:39 It might. They ended up they bought a

20:41 penthouse in like Sydney City as well.

20:43 Yeah, it might have been when she was looking for that and

20:46 she's looking around and they actually, she didn't end up

20:50 purchasing this properly property, but she was looking

20:52 around. She was like, and it was worth

20:54 $36 million. And apparently she said to the

20:56 real estate agent, I wouldn't pay a dollar over 32.

21:01 Like, what a wanker, what a wanker.

21:05 And 32,000,000 of whose money? Whose money?

21:07 Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've got a note here that she

21:10 spent $54,000 in one hit at a shoe store.

21:13 So I think she spent like $250,000 at Dior in 18 months or

21:20 something. And that's just at Dior.

21:21 Yeah, she also had like, Valentino, Louis Vuitton, she

21:25 was spending big and she loved her fashion.

21:29 Oh yeah, shoes galore. They were all catalogued in her

21:32 wardrobe with pictures on the front of the shoe boxes like her

21:35 wardrobe looked. Amazing.

21:37 She wouldn't wear the same outfit twice.

21:39 Yeah, either. So she she was famously known

21:43 for saying that she that she would wear a ball gown to work

21:46 just because she hadn't hadn't everything else to wear that she

21:49 hadn't worn yet. Oh, wow.

21:51 Yeah. People have sort of commented

21:53 that she would rock up in these outfits that really didn't match

21:56 what she was doing. Even this is early days too.

21:59 She was very much into her brand names that even when she wasn't

22:02 pulling 100 hundreds of thousands of dollars from

22:05 people, when she was just skimming the tops of other

22:07 things for, you know, a few $1000, she would rock up to

22:10 work. You know, I mean, they always

22:12 say, you know, dress for the job you want.

22:14 Yeah, but she was fully dressing for the job she wanted like, and

22:17 it was way above where she was actually at.

22:20 Well, I think one of her bosses was like, I couldn't understand

22:22 how she could afford a Louis Vuitton bag and.

22:26 Because she was, she was taking money off you, mate, Yeah.

22:28 And the designer clothes, like, yeah, that's it.

22:30 Yeah. She went on some incredibly

22:33 extravagant holidays I've got listed down here.

22:35 Aspen was a she frequented. I love the Aspen one because

22:39 even to very recent time and husband believes that the the

22:43 place that they were staying in in Aspen that she owned it and

22:48 she would tell people when she was there holidaying in Aspen

22:51 that that was their chalet and that they owned it.

22:53 And it was actually like apparently she bumped into a

22:56 like a a friend. Well, not a friend.

22:58 She they just happened to just get talking to the people and it

23:00 turned out their kids went to school together back here in

23:03 Australia. And this woman was like being

23:05 told that, you know, by her, that by Melissa Kadik that you

23:08 know, that, you know, we own the chalet and she fully knew that

23:10 she didn't. She's like it gets rented out

23:12 like and. And we come here every year and

23:14 we know that I think they knew the owner of.

23:16 Something like that. They legit hate big money.

23:19 Yeah, I think it was Prue and I just love that cause Proof and

23:23 Brighton. Prue and True.

23:25 It just fits really well. But yeah, so she she would just

23:29 tell these blatant lies like this woman was like, I'm being

23:32 such a snob here, but what the hell are you people doing?

23:35 Yeah. So I think it's probably worth

23:39 going back at this point before we really get into her undoing.

23:43 Yeah, we go back to sort of her more her personal life and the

23:46 way that kind of played out. Melissa was originally married,

23:51 so she's got a penchant for men named Tony.

23:57 That's so true. Because her first husband was

24:00 named Tony Anthony Kadik and they were married.

24:05 He was a builders laborer, I believe, when they first got

24:08 married. Yeah.

24:09 And she really, she, she didn't like that.

24:12 He was, he was an English backpacker out here, like he was

24:14 a friend of a friend that she got introduced to her whilst he

24:16 was backpacking out here. Yeah, but as we were saying

24:19 before, she appearances were everything to her and oh God,

24:23 she couldn't possibly marry a labourer.

24:26 So she really pushed him and pushed him to I think he ended

24:29 up studying law in the end. So he was from, from England and

24:34 it at some point they decided to move over there to be closer to

24:38 his family. They had a young son at the time

24:41 and they lived in Essex and he was commuting every day to

24:45 London for work. And by all accounts, he was very

24:49 successful in his career, like he was really establishing

24:51 himself and. But she didn't like Essex.

24:55 No, well she was quite secluded I suppose and she moved from

25:00 Australia. She didn't really know many

25:02 people I don't think being a stay at home mom because she

25:05 wasn't working while she was there.

25:07 So yeah, she wasn't wasn't working when she was in England.

25:12 She was raising their son together, but she wasn't that

25:16 into it, I don't think. No, no, She decided to, well,

25:20 she convinced her husband that she needed to go to a conference

25:22 to stay, you know, involved in this, in the industry that she

25:26 was working in. And I think she said to him she

25:28 was going to Switzerland for a conference, but it turns out

25:32 she'd went to Paris instead. And A and friends saw her in

25:36 Paris. I mean, how freakish that you

25:37 come up and walk, you know, all across the world like this

25:40 random place. And yeah, friends spot

25:42 something, I guess from England to Paris.

25:43 It's not where it was from us that for here in Australia, it

25:45 feels really, you know, like that's so far away.

25:47 Like, yeah. So he's in Paris.

25:50 She's spotted by this friend because she's in Paris

25:53 canoodling with her hairdresser from back in Australia.

25:58 The second Anthony. So the and he's it just happens

26:00 to be the next Anthony. Yeah yeah.

26:02 So yeah. So he's she's big time caught

26:04 because the the friend took photos like it was like obvious

26:07 these two were not there catching up as friends.

26:10 They were canoodling. They were canoodling was the

26:12 word news. So they were making out

26:13 obviously in some cafes. Yeah.

26:17 So now Anthony Anthony number 2 is an interesting character. 10

26:21 years her junior, 1111 is that oh oh.

26:24 Scandal. But people thought that he was

26:28 her son, his yeah, not her husband.

26:32 And. Her boyfriend.

26:32 And your boyfriend? Yeah, yeah.

26:34 So basically when Anthony number one or Tony number one got

26:40 caught Wing so the friend contacted him and was like oh.

26:43 The check things. Out and it turns out that

26:44 friend's wife, Melissa, had actually confided in the wife

26:47 that she'd been cheating on. Oh wow.

26:50 Tony with Anthony. Wow.

26:52 Yeah. Oh, God.

26:53 And so he was like, no, enough's enough.

26:55 We've seen it out in the open. Now it's time for you to to, you

26:59 know, face the music, so to speak.

27:01 Yeah. So when Melissa gets home back

27:05 to London or back to Essex from this work trip, he confronts her

27:10 about it and decides to go. And, you know, they have a bit

27:13 of a fight. She never admits to it even

27:16 though he's got proof. She just sort of manipulates the

27:21 situation. Anyway, he decides to go and

27:24 stay, I think with his family for a few days.

27:26 And in that time she basically starts creating this sob story

27:32 though. So she's contacted her brother

27:34 in Australia and said that that Tony number one is abusive, he's

27:40 controlling, she's not allowed to do anything and really builds

27:44 up the fact that he's a not has not been a nice husband.

27:48 Yeah. So her brother flies as soon

27:50 like straight away over to London to get her back, get

27:54 around to Australia and get her out of this abusive environment.

27:58 And lo and behold, she cleared out everything.

28:02 She cleared out their bank accounts, She took all of the

28:04 jewelry. She even took like cutlery and

28:08 random stuff like that. God, yeah, yeah, just a mess

28:13 with him it. Makes no sense.

28:15 Anyway, she basically brings their son home to Australia as

28:20 well and completely cuts. Contact to the point she changed

28:24 the phone number so Tony number one's back in in England unable

28:29 to contact. His child, yes.

28:31 So he actually comes over to Australia to and knocks on their

28:35 door and he's like, I need to see my son.

28:38 He kind of then in this story, pretty much fades into the

28:41 background. Yeah, you don't get much of like

28:44 that and know what goes on there, which you know, we don't

28:46 need to. Absolutely.

28:47 But I think it's worth noting that it has come out that he was

28:50 none of the things that Melissa accused him of being.

28:53 He wasn't controlling, he wasn't abusive.

28:55 He confronted her because she'd done something wrong and that

28:59 made him a monster in her eyes. Yeah, but she, and this is the

29:01 story she continued to tell to everyone.

29:03 Yep. And everyone felt a lot of

29:05 empathy for her in this situation where, you know, as

29:08 the story that she was telling that she was being abused and.

29:10 Because he believed the person who's being abused, that's why.

29:14 Yeah, as we should. As we should.

29:16 There are very few women out there who lie about this stuff,

29:19 and this woman is definitely one out of the bag like she.

29:22 Absolutely. Is it how lie that tarnishes,

29:25 you know, reputations and stories for Yeah, for other

29:29 women who are actually experiencing these?

29:31 100%. Yeah, shame on her.

29:34 Shame on her in so many ways. Oh, well, this is it.

29:35 It's just it's her character in general.

29:37 And once she realized what she really who she really was,

29:40 because I mean, she put across to everyone and like you listen

29:44 to family and friends about her as a person, they all thought

29:47 she was lovely and bubbly and fun and that she was just this

29:51 really nice person. And she was not like there was

29:55 just nothing about her that was likable.

29:57 She was under the surface. She was just, she all she cared

30:00 about was herself in the inquest, which I know I'm sort

30:04 of skipping ahead a bit here, but there was a psychologist who

30:09 took the stand at the inquest. Yeah.

30:11 And she said that Melissa without being able to formally

30:14 diagnose her. But Melissa displayed all the

30:18 signs of having a narcissistic personality disorder.

30:22 Sociopathic narcissist, yeah, is what Yeah basically said she

30:26 would be if they could sit her down.

30:28 From all accounts of friends, family, of what everyone

30:31 described and the actions that they know she took, this is

30:34 that's the out. That's the way they could

30:35 diagnose her was yeah, yeah. Oh yeah.

30:38 And she really, really and truly was.

30:41 Yeah. So we now get to her

30:44 relationship with Anthony Coletti.

30:46 Well, isn't he an interesting character?

30:48 So he was her hairdresser when he sort of established, you

30:52 know, more established his relationship with her.

30:56 He was no longer really hairdressing.

30:59 He'd do some clients I think part time.

31:01 He also did prawn breeding. Yeah, yeah, I looked into all

31:07 these. And prawn breeding.

31:10 Interesting one. And he, oh, I mean his passion,

31:13 his life's work, Deejaying. Yeah, please do yourselves A

31:16 favour and jump on Spotify and look up Pause off Paws as in

31:23 animal Paws Paws Paws Off is his music and you'll find his album

31:31 there. Yep, so worth a listen.

31:34 It is. It is fantastic.

31:36 I mean, I don't really want to give this guy any more of my

31:39 money, but I mean, look. I don't think he's making any

31:41 money out of the views he's getting on Spotify.

31:47 The album title is Raid, and that is my favorite song on the

31:52 whole on the album. Yeah, it's a bit of a spoken

31:56 word, like lyrics. I'm just going to read you a

32:00 couple of my favorite. Please yes, bring it.

32:03 A young lady from a large corporation that tortured a lady

32:06 for 14 hours. The rhyming just gets me.

32:12 Might get a snake or a rat and call it Isabella.

32:15 I'll buy the ugliest thing I can find.

32:17 So Isabella, Isabella Allen was the ASIC lead investigator?

32:25 Yeah, lead investigator. Who ended up taking out an Ivo

32:28 against him because he was that horrific.

32:31 Yeah, yeah. So they're married, they've

32:34 bought this, you know, property in Dover Heights.

32:37 They're living the high life. He's got a 400 odd $1000 sports

32:41 car. She's buying these extravagant.

32:43 He is living the life because he he genuinely thinks, I think he

32:49 genuinely thinks that it's all legitimate and that she's this

32:52 incredible financial wizard and she's got all this money and she

32:59 really controlled him. At the end of the day,

33:02 unbeknownst to him, he was in an abusive relationship.

33:05 Yeah, I mean, he's certainly met a need for her and and she had a

33:10 lot of control over him and she. Had all the control.

33:13 I think that actually plays a lot into his actions after Oh

33:17 yeah, Melissa's disappearance. But we'll we'll get to that in a

33:20 second. So they're living this lovely

33:23 life. Things are going really, really

33:26 well. And what happens?

33:28 I think it was let me just get my I need to make sure on the

33:33 early in the early hours of the 11th of November who knocks on

33:37 their door at like 5:30 in the morning.

33:39 Well, no. Wasn't 5:30 in the morning?

33:41 Well, according to according to Anthony, it was 5:30 in the

33:44 morning. According to ASIC, it was more

33:46 like 630. Oh, really?

33:47 Yeah. OK.

33:48 Yeah, Yeah. OK.

33:50 Well. Because ASIC even say like we

33:51 have to be careful about overtime hours and so we would

33:54 be knocking on the door at 5:30 in the morning for overtime

33:57 hours. So I love that because he just,

33:58 he really ramps it up in those songs about how bad that.

34:01 Rate. I reckon that's where I got my

34:02 5:30 from. Actually, totally not from the

34:04 song. Yeah, it's from the song.

34:07 I really need to check my sources.

34:10 They had a warrant to search and seize any proceeds of crime.

34:17 Yeah, essentially the crimes that Melissa had committed.

34:19 So they've been working on this case for months and months and

34:23 months in the lead up to this day.

34:26 Yeah. There's question whether or not

34:29 Melissa caught wind potentially of the fact that ASIC were

34:33 looking into her. So there there was a really

34:36 interesting thing that happened maybe about a month before the

34:40 raid, a pure and utter chance. So when Melissa would go to

34:46 Aspen, she would try and recruit clients over there because

34:48 obviously people who are in those situations rich, you know,

34:52 they've got lots of money. And she actually was able to

34:55 recruit a client in, in Aspen, an Australian woman who chose to

35:00 invest two and a half million dollars of her money with

35:03 Melissa. And this, that woman was then

35:07 sitting in a dentist's office waiting to have a teeth cleaning

35:10 done. And she was sitting next to a

35:13 woman in the in the waiting room.

35:16 And they got chatting. I'm not even sure what sparked

35:19 the conversation, but they got chatting and they discovered.

35:23 So the woman, the other woman, not the Aspen woman, the other

35:26 one sitting in the chair. She was the woman whose license

35:30 Melissa was using to trade Rachel.

35:33 Yeah. Right to trade like she

35:36 obviously needed a, an accreditation number in order to

35:39 do some of the not even legitimate.

35:42 She'd borrowed this woman's number to put on the, on the

35:46 paperwork, paperwork that she was already forging.

35:49 And this woman knew about it. But I, I don't, I never, I

35:52 couldn't find anything about whether she'd gone to ASIC or

35:56 whether she was the informant. They believe that Rachel was the

35:59 informant was at least one of the informants because so I

36:03 believe there was a phone call from Melissa to this Rachel

36:06 asking can I just borrow your number at one stage.

36:08 What? Yeah, yeah.

36:09 To which Rachel was like no, that's fully illegal.

36:12 You can't do that, which I think then triggered for this Rachel.

36:17 Well hang on a second. Has she done this before?

36:19 And I so I do believe that Rachel hat was one of the

36:22 informants and rang asset going I think my numbers being used

36:27 inappropriately. Yeah.

36:28 So I think that's what triggered it back further.

36:30 OK. And the other one was a doctor

36:32 in Perth, Yeah, yeah. So there was some doctors.

36:36 Somehow she managed to get infiltrate some doctors in Perth

36:38 Earth and one of the doctors that he was like, Yep, Keane as

36:41 I want to invest. $4 million. You have a fair bit of money,

36:44 but just so happens his wife was an accountant.

36:46 So no, not a financial advisor, completely different job.

36:49 But being an accountant, she was a bit more savvy and she wanted

36:54 to ask questions like what's the number?

36:56 What's her financial advisor number?

36:58 What's, you know, how's this being invested in things and

37:00 these questions where they're not being able to be answered

37:02 properly, that this accountant then I believe also was an

37:05 informant. Yeah, potentially.

37:07 But Melissa Cook, because they started asking Melissa all these

37:10 questions, she literally gave them their money back without

37:13 any. Questions.

37:14 All of a sudden it was like, oh, actually I can't.

37:16 I actually can't help you. I can't help.

37:18 You, yeah. So I think that also raised a

37:20 red flag for them to work. You can't just pull that money

37:23 out without our signatures like you should have.

37:27 You shouldn't have been able to do that.

37:28 So that obviously got them. So the Rachel in the dentist's

37:33 office said to this lady from that Melissa had met in Aspen,

37:36 take your money out Now there's something going on.

37:39 This is not legitimate. And so she rings Melissa and

37:43 she's like, oh, Melissa, I've actually, she fabricated as in,

37:46 yeah, she fabricated this story. But she said, oh, I found a

37:49 house that I want to buy and can I please have my money back?

37:52 You know, And by all accounts, at this point, Melissa had told

37:56 her that she'd made $300,000 return on her investment at that

38:01 point. So, you know, by all accounts,

38:04 she should have $2.8 million now in in her fund.

38:08 And Melissa is like, oh, no, you know, property is not a good

38:12 investment. This is not a good idea.

38:14 I strongly advise against it. And she really stood her ground.

38:17 She was like, no, no, I want my money.

38:19 Yeah, I think she's the only one.

38:21 And the Perth, the Perth doctor, Yeah.

38:23 Who were able to actually get out before?

38:26 Right before, yeah. There were certain ones that

38:28 legitimately like retired and one of their supers paid out and

38:31 things like that, which she like, this is the thing with a

38:33 Ponzi scheme, which is what this was.

38:34 Yeah. Which is basically a fancy word

38:37 for robbing Peter to pay Paul. Yeah.

38:39 She would legit like just take this money off people and use it

38:41 for herself to pay for what she wanted to live on and do where.

38:45 And so these this money was not being invested how they were

38:47 expecting it to be invested. But so she would have to then

38:50 like basically go, this person would come to her and say, yeah,

38:52 look, I'm ready to retire. I'd like to pull out my money.

38:54 And she would then have to scrounge and try and pull all

38:57 this money together. And actually, there's a few

38:59 people that got their money back by doing that.

39:01 But that legit that that's just meant that she then had to go

39:04 and find another client to replace what least more than

39:06 one. You know, that's why she built

39:08 from going, you know, I only have 15 clients at a time to

39:11 this sixty that she ended up with at the time of the when

39:14 they when she was found out because she was like, we'll need

39:17 more. I need, I need more money.

39:18 So I've got to get more investors.

39:20 Yeah. Insane.

39:21 Oh. Insane.

39:22 Yeah. So she ended up giving the $2.8

39:24 million back. So she's down 300 grand, would

39:28 you be? Great.

39:28 Grateful that you got a bit of a tip off to get out, but yeah.

39:32 Not everybody was so lucky. No.

39:34 So the raid happens and ASIC, so they turn up with the AFP, the

39:39 Australian Federal Police and they are allowed to seize

39:44 anything that was purchased with investor funds.

39:48 And so they have gone and they've taken all of her

39:50 designer clothing, all of her jewellery.

39:53 There were two wedding dress. There was Oh yeah, for one piece

39:57 of jewellery, a lot of them were worth, you know, hundred 100,000

40:02 here, 200,000 there. Yeah.

40:04 All these, all these designer clothes, they took her laptops,

40:08 they took anything hard. Drives of CCTV that was around

40:12 the house unfortunately. Yeah, yeah.

40:16 They took anything of value in the house.

40:17 Yeah. Watches galore.

40:20 Raid or Yeah, the raid and seizure took about 14 hours I

40:24 believe. So they were there for a really

40:25 long time. ASIC put out a report at the end

40:30 of all of this and basically, I mean, they were wearing yeah,

40:36 body recording devices. So we know a lot about what

40:40 happened in that day. Apparently Melissa, at certain

40:44 point. So.

40:45 So it was later claimed that they denied her food and water

40:48 and. Which was not Pause Off's music.

40:51 Oh my God, I think Anthony was really put out by the fact that

40:55 they took so much of their personal items as well.

41:01 Well. Yeah, He was like convinced that

41:03 this was all legit, that this money was hit theirs and, you

41:06 know, well, his and that they should have been taking

41:09 anything. Yeah.

41:10 They took his sports card, too. That really upsetting.

41:14 He did. He didn't like that, No.

41:16 So you can imagine going through this, whether I mean, Melissa

41:19 obviously knows she's guilty. Anthony doesn't.

41:23 What I find that interesting, with the body Cam footage, the

41:25 bits that you do get to have been able to see the way her,

41:28 like her body language, etcetera, you could say she was

41:31 terrified. Yeah.

41:32 And she knew she'd been caught and she was done.

41:34 Yeah. Which speaks to a lot.

41:36 For what? Came next, I think, yeah, I

41:38 think so, yeah, yeah. So the end of, you know, ASIC

41:43 have gone. They've basically said to her so

41:45 I think this happened on a Wednesday, yeah, they said to

41:48 her that she needed to appear in court on the Friday morning.

41:52 Now this is in 2020 COVID time. November of 2020.

41:56 So we'll yeah, Melbourne probably still in a lockdown.

41:59 Yep, no doubt, No doubt. But she had to appear via video

42:03 link because court wasn't sitting face to face still at

42:06 that point. Yeah, basically what happened in

42:08 that interim time. So ASIC leaves her house.

42:12 I think it was about 5:00 in the afternoon.

42:15 They've taken everything. They don't have much left at

42:17 all. Apparently they had take away

42:19 for dinner her and her son and Anthony and then.

42:23 Well, I think that her phone was able, it was being able to be

42:25 tracked from that point. And they said that she Google

42:27 searched Uber Eats of where to where to get dinner and a

42:30 lawyer. Yeah, which I mean, I wasn't

42:33 able to get an answer on this. So during the raid, to me, first

42:36 and foremost would be I'll call my lawyer, lawyer.

42:39 And to me, someone who, I mean, this is a game where it undoes

42:41 her a little bit. Someone who is operating with a

42:44 business that is that many hundreds of thousands dollars,

42:46 millions of dollars. Surely you have a lawyer.

42:50 If you don't have a lawyer, you surely have someone who knows

42:53 someone who knows someone who knows someone who would be like,

42:56 I'll get you onto this person. I'm shocked that she didn't call

42:59 a lawyer whilst there was police there.

43:02 But what was She had said to the lawyer?

43:04 Well, to me, a lawyer would have been able to rock up and at

43:06 least advise her. Don't say any more.

43:09 Or you know, like 100% she should have had a lawyer with

43:12 her that day. Yeah, from what we get.

43:15 And then, look, I mean, maybe we're not getting everything.

43:17 And maybe maybe Anthony's correct in this, in his music,

43:20 how he says that we weren't even allowed to get a lawyer.

43:23 I'm. Well, that's not legal.

43:25 I'm fairly certain that the one person who could have walked

43:27 through that door that day to support that situation would

43:30 have been a lawyer. Yeah.

43:31 To wait until they've left before she starts Google

43:33 searching. A lawyer.

43:35 I would have been Google searching.

43:36 I would have been on the phone. Who do I need to get to?

43:39 Like, whether you're guilty or innocent, like whatever, like,

43:41 you know, where's, where's lawyer?

43:43 I need a lawyer. Yep.

43:45 Yep. But wouldn't you have done that

43:46 at 6:30 in the morning, 7:00 in the morning?

43:49 You wouldn't have waited all day, but I feel.

43:50 Like no, she just. Apparently, at one point she

43:52 even went and laid down on the bed.

43:54 During the race. She didn't.

43:55 She did seem to just sort of. Just shut down I reckon.

43:57 Yeah, yeah, because the other thing that gets me is that

44:01 Anthony says that that evening after they've all left.

44:04 OK, well and how would you react if if people just come through

44:08 your house and raided the whole place?

44:10 I would have had a million and one questions for my partner

44:12 going, you know, like. Right.

44:13 What the actual? Just happened, yeah.

44:16 He never asked her a thing. No, in fact, he said quote UN

44:20 quote, we had a normal night. Sorry, what we?

44:23 Cuddled to go to sleep? Yep, she just needed me to

44:26 cuddle. Her she had a bath and we just I

44:28 cuddled her to sleep. What?

44:30 I would have been like, whoa, the the questions could not have

44:34 come thick enough, but I think this.

44:36 I think this plays into her control over here.

44:38 Like he didn't feel like he could ask questions of.

44:41 Her and that's how he has absolutely no understanding no

44:46 of the control and abuse that was being done to him.

44:48 Yeah, he is still under that spell.

44:51 Yes. Of I have no power here.

44:53 I'm not to speak and I'm not to ask questions.

44:55 This is for her to sort out. Yeah, man.

44:57 Oh, it's it's mind blowing. Yeah.

44:59 So they go to bed around midnight, 5:30.

45:02 This one legit is 530 because her son attests to the fact that

45:06 he heard the front door closing at around that.

45:09 Time he did a question mark on that is there because the gym

45:13 was on the third floor. Yep.

45:15 And they said that the distance between the the gym and the

45:19 front door, you wouldn't hear the click of the door.

45:23 Oh, OK, but her son was in bed. No, he, I think he said he was

45:26 in the gym, he was working out or something.

45:28 Oh, OK. Yeah, but even then, even from

45:30 his bedroom, which it was all that was like wherever he was,

45:33 it was on the third floor of the house.

45:35 OK. I mean, this place was pretty

45:37 massive and it had this incredible view from the rooftop

45:39 to the Sydney Harbour. Stunning.

45:42 But yeah, he was on the 3rd floor and the obviously to the

45:46 door. They questioned whether or not

45:47 he actually could have heard the door click.

45:49 OK. All right.

45:51 OK. So she's left at some point in

45:52 the morning. Yeah, she's left behind her

45:55 phone, wallet, keys she has taken.

45:58 She was meant to be meeting a friend to go for a run.

46:02 She had a personal trainer that was also invested in her with

46:05 with her business and lost a lot of money.

46:08 And she was meant to be meeting her to go for a run.

46:10 And she didn't text message her during the morning.

46:12 Yeah, to say I won't be able to meet today.

46:14 And then. Yeah.

46:15 So. But no one's hurt, seen or heard

46:17 of her. From her since.

46:18 Since. She's gone missing, so she's

46:21 gone out. She's got nothing with her.

46:23 Anthony just stays at home all day waiting for her.

46:27 Doesn't come ring. Anybody doesn't do anything.

46:31 He literally does nothing. Literally what would he have

46:34 actually done? I don't even think they had a

46:35 TV. Well.

46:37 I mean that's the thing, he was complaining that they had access

46:39 to no money. Like he couldn't even buy food.

46:41 They had an $800 a week allowance.

46:45 Was that from? Immediately, immediately right

46:47 as it gave them pretty decent, I know.

46:50 Better than settling. Yeah.

46:51 Now in the lead up to this, Melissa had done a few things

46:54 which I've, you know, I guess are suspicious.

46:57 Yeah, she paid 6 months worth of their mortgage repayments

47:02 upfront, whereas she'd been paying monthly before that.

47:06 Asked Anthony to help her get a shredder.

47:10 A shredder, like an industrial $3000 shredding machine.

47:15 That was sort of, yeah, that was building up the months prior,

47:17 wasn't it, I? Think in the July.

47:19 Yeah, yeah. So that was a, that was sort of

47:20 a little bit of a indicator of that.

47:21 She might have had wind of something with us.

47:24 Something was going on. The other thing she did was she

47:28 deleted all of her social media profiles.

47:30 That's right, Yes, she did. And Facebook or?

47:34 Instagram, Facebook, Instagram so that I'm guessing so she

47:37 couldn't be traced. I reckon more so like that she

47:41 knew this was gonna be big news and people couldn't.

47:44 Tag her or contact. Her find her like in terms of

47:47 finding information about her from the media and that sort of

47:49 thing and go searching for her photos and yeah, yeah.

47:52 So there's been knowledge that something was coming, yeah.

47:57 Whether it was just, I mean, these things can't go on

47:59 forever. There's got seriously, how how

48:02 long do you think you can keep this up for?

48:03 And from what people said about her too, that she was a very

48:06 stressed person. It was very stressful for her to

48:09 run this Ponzi scheme, you know, and earn all this money get.

48:11 All this poorly diddums. But yeah, so she wasn't in a

48:14 good way. She was pretty stressed out and

48:16 agitated. And maybe she just knew that

48:18 this was. There's got to be an end.

48:20 Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, but or, or she'd been

48:22 tipped off in some way that. Yeah, so she's missing for a day

48:28 the next morning. So she's missing the ASIC rate

48:31 happened Wednesday. Missing all day Thursday,

48:33 Anthony. Like, this is what gets me.

48:35 He's gone to bed Thursday night. She still hasn't come home to

48:38 get any of her things. She's still missing.

48:41 What does he do? Oh, this is the best.

48:44 This is actually the best. Before going to bed on Thursday

48:46 night, what does he do? Mega.

48:47 No, you go. No, you go.

48:48 Go, go, go, go. He gets in his car and he plays

48:53 her favorite music that he's created on loudspeaker.

48:58 He winds down his windows and he drives around Dover Heights,

49:02 hoping that his music will attract her back to him or.

49:06 If he didn't really do. That Well, look, I think there's

49:09 in the inquest, it actually, this is his story.

49:12 This is what he told police that he did.

49:13 Yeah. But in the inquest it actually

49:16 came out because they were able to track his phone and his

49:18 movement. Yeah, he didn't actually do

49:20 that, but I love that. I love that that's his story.

49:23 Oh, then he thought that was like, really?

49:24 I don't know that people would be like, oh, he's so beautiful.

49:30 But what he actually did was he went around to a friend's place,

49:33 smoked a joint and went back home.

49:36 He did not disclose to this friend that Melissa was missing.

49:39 He did not disclose to this friend that they'd been raided

49:42 the day before. So this friend just thought, Oh

49:45 yeah, he's just come over for a regular Thursday night.

49:47 Yep, wouldn't you be like, mate, you wouldn't be.

49:49 What's what's been going on? Like my wife's missing.

49:52 Don't you think he'd want to tell someone something?

49:55 Oh, I mean, because I do OK. The situation he was in, I fully

50:00 think that he was in a situation where he was like, I don't want

50:03 to do anything because I think I'll get into trouble, I'll do

50:05 the wrong thing. I do get that perspective.

50:07 And there was another thing he did say that I'll agree with

50:09 him. There is an you sort of think

50:13 with an adult going missing, you have to wait 24 hours before you

50:15 can report them missing. However, in this situation with

50:19 an ASIC raid on their house, think it's kind of important

50:23 that you disclose that she's not, she's missing immediately.

50:27 But not only that, yeah. Because the situation that we're

50:30 in, it's highly volatile, like what she would do.

50:34 You want to be able to protect her and look after her and make

50:36 sure she's OK like if nothing else.

50:38 Yeah. Do you think it's still a widely

50:41 like thought out thing that people think you have to wait 24

50:44 hours to report someone missing? Personally, if there was an

50:47 adult, child, whatever missing, I would do it immediately.

50:49 And even if those cops turned to me and said come back in 24

50:52 hours, I'd be right. I'd be like don't.

50:54 Think, I don't think in this day and age they would do that

50:56 because in 24 hours they're losing a lot of a lot of

51:00 potential information. In this situation, 100% they

51:04 wouldn't have been. Go away and wait 24 hours.

51:06 Yeah, 100%. Once they'd realized who she was

51:08 and what was going on, they would have looked into it.

51:11 Having said that, when he reported her missing, so OK, the

51:14 next morning, Friday morning, she's meant to attend court via

51:17 video link. The video link pops up and it's

51:20 Anthony's face. So they've got the ASIC

51:23 investigators there and the, the, the judge from the court

51:26 for the court hearing, Anthony pops up and they're like,

51:29 where's Melissa? And he goes, she's not here.

51:32 And like, well, where is she? And he goes he.

51:33 Was out. He wanted to know if she was on

51:35 the link. Yeah.

51:35 She was like, is she here? Yeah.

51:37 Oh, she's not here. Oh well, I haven't seen her

51:40 since 2 nights before. Because this again what what

51:43 gets me in this right. So that court hearing happened

51:46 and there's obviously Asic's lawyer on the call and there's

51:50 AK is on the screen on his little logo and there's no one

51:53 else. So the the court not

51:55 understanding sort of, you know, who's present and they do that.

51:58 They call you and say, you know, is someone here representing,

52:00 you know, the the respondent and then, you know, this sort of

52:03 thing and like and they're like, oh, we believe there is someone

52:05 here AK like and because they're thinking this could be her

52:09 lawyer, but it's not It's Anthony.

52:13 Anthony And he's like, oh what? Melissa's not here.

52:16 And they're like, no, like where is she?

52:19 And he? He goes, well, I don't know.

52:20 And they're like, well, have you reported her missing?

52:22 And he goes no. No.

52:24 So he's they're just to adjourn the court hearing.

52:25 Yeah. Because they're like, you need

52:27 to go to the cops, you need to report that she's.

52:29 Missing, he still takes I think 6 hours after that until he

52:33 actually calls the police and then so he called he he goes

52:37 down to Bondi, yeah, police station to report her missing,

52:41 right. They then say to him we need to

52:44 interview you and he goes no, no.

52:46 Thanks. I did not know that he refused

52:47 to be interviewed. Yeah, so because he'd be shit

52:49 scared, he'd say something. Wrong.

52:50 Yep. So they then go back to his

52:52 house because they're like, well, we need to see, yeah, some

52:54 evidence, have a look. And they walk in and they're

52:56 like, where's all that stuff? Yeah, like, what's going on?

53:00 And then they see on the table that the ASIC, all the warrant.

53:05 The warrant. Yeah, all of the the stuff.

53:08 And they're like, whoa, whoa. And these were uniformed police

53:11 officers who did this initial search.

53:13 Body cams on them too. Yeah, they've then escalated

53:17 that to a more senior officer. They immediately were like, he's

53:22 potentially done something here too.

53:23 That's what they think. Yeah, their immediate instinct,

53:26 there's three of the three of them all had the same instinct

53:28 that I will. It's he's got something to do

53:30 with their disappearance. Yeah, it was that dodgy like

53:32 what he was, how he was reacting and his.

53:35 Story is really weird and he's really evasive with them.

53:39 So they escalate it to a Sergeant named Trent Riley and

53:43 you can watch his body Cam footage as well when he then

53:45 comes to the house. So I think he spoke to Tony on

53:49 the phone and then he's come to the house as well to further the

53:52 investigation or to figure out exactly what's going on.

53:56 And he says to Anthony, mate, I'm really concerned here like

53:59 this is this is really unusual what's happened, what's

54:03 happened? And he's like, oh, I can't give

54:04 you any information about that. I can't tell you anything about

54:07 that. Yeah, he.

54:09 He won't. It's like he's not being

54:11 cooperative. And then when they challenge him

54:13 and say you're not being cooperative, he's like, no, no,

54:16 I'll do whatever it takes, whatever it takes, I'll help

54:19 you. And they're like, OK, so when

54:20 did you last see Melissa? And he's like, oh, yeah.

54:24 Well, it was the night before last.

54:25 And they're like, well, that's not what you told us when you

54:28 originally reported her missing. You told us you'd seen her in

54:30 the morning. And yeah.

54:32 His story just never added up. No, in the inquest, The judge

54:35 actually, sorry, the coroner at the inquest actually called him

54:40 on all this and said we can't actually really take your

54:43 account for what it's worth because yet take it into account

54:47 because. It chops and changes.

54:48 It's too much. And there's so many different

54:50 versions of events. Yeah.

54:52 He was an unreliable witness. I genuinely think though that

54:56 that was just him being him. As in, like, I think he's a

54:59 sandwich short of a picnic. Oh 100%, I don't know, just

55:03 listen. Listen purposefully being

55:04 evasive. So, so he when he filled out

55:08 this is this will just give you a bit of an idea as to exactly

55:10 how his mind works. When he was filling out the

55:13 missing persons report for Melissa at the police station

55:17 when he first did it, they get you to fill out what, what was

55:19 she last wearing? And so it's like she was wearing

55:22 activewear. She was wearing these ASICS

55:23 shoes. Or he wrote Nike, but yeah.

55:25 Oh, he did write Nike, actually, that's right.

55:27 But she was actually wearing ASICS.

55:29 We know that for sure later. And then there's a section to

55:33 write what underwear she was wearing and he wrote Grandma.

55:37 No, he did not. Oh my God, that you got into

55:42 trouble for Anthony so. The other thing is like when the

55:46 police ask her, ask him like why do you think she's gone missing?

55:50 This is before they knew all of the ASIC stuff.

55:52 He goes, oh, no reason I have. I have no idea why she would

55:54 have gone missing. Yeah, she's got no reason to

55:58 disappear right now. There's nothing going on in our

56:00 lives. We're just regular millionaires.

56:04 Yep, Yep. Apparently he was quite sweaty

56:07 when they asked him questions too.

56:08 Like he was getting really worked up.

56:10 Like he couldn't, he couldn't, he couldn't.

56:14 Like, I don't know, he was so on edge and.

56:18 Obviously he was going to get in trouble with Melissa.

56:22 So 100 days after Melissa went missing, was it 400 kilometers?

56:28 400 kilometers down the coast. Yeah, yeah.

56:30 There are some kids walking along the beach.

56:33 Yeah, a very secluded beach by all accounts.

56:35 Yeah. And they discover a shoe.

56:40 And inside that shoe is, and it was obviously forensically

56:45 tested and it was proven to be Melissa's foot.

56:49 Now the foot was so degraded that they can't actually tell

56:53 how the foot was severed from the leg.

56:57 So they don't know whether it was a shark bite or whether it

57:00 was sawn off, that the bone was too degraded to be able to

57:03 actually make that determination.

57:05 So nobody actually knows to this day what has happened to Melissa

57:10 or even that she's 100% dead. No.

57:12 Well, the coroner did in 2023 declare that she's dead.

57:16 Yeah, but and also said, but couldn't decide how.

57:20 The manner of death is still death.

57:22 Yeah, yeah. Open but still, yeah.

57:24 Everyone, I mean the people who knew her very well all say she

57:30 would have categorically had a Plan B.

57:32 Yep. Which then opens up, I mean,

57:35 there's these people who genuinely knew her, are not

57:37 convinced that she wouldn't have cut her own foot off and found a

57:41 way of getting back, you know, climbing back and getting her

57:44 money back. Yeah.

57:45 I just, I don't know. What do you think?

57:48 Look, the narcissist that she was and what I know of

57:51 narcissist, I struggle with the thought that she's topped

57:55 herself, that I don't know that, that that just doesn't seem

58:00 right to me. The thought of her being

58:02 murdered, I have looked and I've gone down a few rabbit holes on

58:05 this of like, OK, so if if it's if she was, if there's foul play

58:08 here, who would that have been? And if so, you think, OK, so

58:13 there's got to be someone helping her in this financial

58:15 situation of like stealing all this money potentially were

58:17 other people involved and didn't want their names coming out?

58:20 So I can understand that maybe there was someone there who

58:22 potentially could have murdered her, but I go down all these

58:25 rabbit holes and there's no one, there isn't anyone that sticks

58:28 out. There's one guy who was an

58:30 accountant that she had in Brisbane who was being put in

58:33 jail for fraudulent financial matters previously, but don't

58:38 think so from what I can research on him well.

58:42 I don't think, I think they they looked down that yeah, it's been

58:46 pretty. He was, he was not in like he

58:48 couldn't have been in New South. Wales.

58:49 Not at the time, no. So there's, there's much so that

58:54 kind of, I feel like that's a dead end too.

58:56 So then the only other than option is that she is still

58:59 alive and out there and has gone on the run.

59:02 I mean, she did have flying lessons and the people have

59:04 talked about maybe she jumped, she got on a plane and flew

59:07 herself somewhere or she's got on a yacht, which is plenty of

59:10 those, you know, fairly accessible.

59:12 And but they've looked at marinas and they've looked at

59:13 CCTV. No one has.

59:16 Found anything or? The thing that gets me the most

59:19 out of all this mystery, and it is going to be a mystery

59:22 forever, I believe for this. So her CCTV footage of her from

59:26 her house was turned off because they took all the hard drives.

59:30 So her walking out of her front door is not on any footage,

59:34 absolutely. But in that area there was CCTV

59:38 footage being from other houses in the street and other areas

59:42 around. So they've gone, the police have

59:45 gone and got all that footage. She's nowhere to be seen.

59:48 So if she walked somewhere or drove her car somewhere, it

59:52 would have been picked up on CCTV and it was not.

59:56 So the only other option then is that she was picked up by

59:58 somebody and then we don't know what that vehicle looks like to

1:00:01 know that she'd be in that car on the CCTV footage.

1:00:04 So it's a that gets me. Where did she go from walking

1:00:08 out her front door? Did she walk out her front door?

1:00:10 Like how that gets me. Agreed.

1:00:13 But at the end of that, I think if her foot's rocked up, she's

1:00:15 not hopping around somewhere. No, I think, I think she's dead.

1:00:20 I do. I think I just don't know.

1:00:21 How? And I agree with you in that

1:00:24 given her narcissistic traits, the fact I find it hard to come

1:00:28 out that she would have killed herself.

1:00:29 Although if she was so like this has tarnished her reputation so

1:00:35 bad that she thought there's no way I'm ever coming back from

1:00:37 this. Yeah, maybe that would have

1:00:38 pushed her over the edge to go down you.

1:00:40 Look at her in that, that footage from, as we were saying

1:00:42 from the from the raid. Yeah, she looks pretty stressed

1:00:46 and she knows, like her, it's all coming crashing down.

1:00:49 She doesn't want to have to face the music.

1:00:51 Yeah. Yeah, I don't think.

1:00:52 She will ever know popping. Around some island living a life

1:00:55 I really don't. I think she's dead.

1:00:56 And the thought of her being able to manage like a, you know,

1:00:59 OK, she's gone, maybe she's gone somewhere and had someone

1:01:01 surgically remove the foot and have a prosthetic and recover

1:01:05 from that. You know, So when you think

1:01:08 about the number of people she would have would have to be in

1:01:09 on this to have and then to have dropped the foot in the ocean

1:01:12 and to you know what I mean, like to actually.

1:01:15 And to have it found, yeah, yeah.

1:01:17 And to have it so degraded and they found like lots of marine

1:01:20 microorganisms like in the tissue, which they can prove

1:01:24 they they're pretty sure they can date it to almost 100 days

1:01:27 that had a bit that the foot had been in the ocean.

1:01:29 I mean, you're not chopping off a foot and then dropping it the

1:01:31 same day. You know, it's going to take

1:01:33 time to recover to have your prosthetic, prosthetic leg foot

1:01:36 attached, you know, and all these sorts of things.

1:01:37 Like I just the thought of all that doesn't really make sense

1:01:40 to me at all. Saying that.

1:01:42 So I think she's dead. Yeah, yeah.

1:01:45 Yeah. But I mean then that now there's

1:01:48 left the situation of twenty $25 million has been stolen from

1:01:55 about 60 odd people and it's getting that money back to, you

1:01:58 know, or trying to get back some of that money to these people.

1:02:01 There was an Ave. that we'll I was looking at that with self

1:02:05 managed super funds. There is a process in this to

1:02:08 regulate it in terms of they've got to audit it every 12 months.

1:02:12 So she had other people helping her in this situation.

1:02:16 And so the auditors that she was using to look at these, a

1:02:20 question is, as a person who's investing all that amount of

1:02:22 money, why are you not having your audited independently?

1:02:26 She, I think, was offering up an independent auditor who did this

1:02:30 process. So they're a bit liable because

1:02:32 they didn't pick up any of this stuff.

1:02:34 There wasn't a red flag put out there at all.

1:02:37 Yeah, and biggest red flag of a simple 6 digit number rather

1:02:41 than 8 digit number. Yes.

1:02:42 So they weren't doing their due date.

1:02:43 There was actually a financial advisor that I found who said

1:02:46 that any good financial advisor, any half decent financial

1:02:50 advisor would can log into the background of these COMSEC

1:02:53 accounts and check on their process.

1:02:56 Right? As an auditor, that's what your

1:02:58 job is right? You literally like that is 101

1:03:00 auditing of super super self managed supers.

1:03:05 That was not done by this company because they would have

1:03:08 been logged in and gone. There's no account.

1:03:10 So there's lots of question marks over where this money,

1:03:14 this money isn't just just Melissa Catix like crime.

1:03:18 You know what I mean? There's other people who have

1:03:20 stuffed up here for sure. I mean, look, we don't we can't

1:03:24 all be financial gurus and know how to, you know, operate our

1:03:27 super funds and things. But to me, if you don't know

1:03:30 enough then you shouldn't be pulling it out of a managed

1:03:33 self, but you know out of a fund that is reputable and handing it

1:03:36 over to someone either. Yeah, without doing your own due

1:03:38 diligence and having somebody to look into it.

1:03:41 So ASIC have employed and I think like the the AFP as well,

1:03:47 have employed, employed a forensic accountant to kind of

1:03:51 go through everything and figure it all out and tease out what

1:03:54 was real, which wasn't much and what wasn't.

1:03:57 They were then able to, you know, they've obviously got a

1:04:00 lot of her possessions that were really valuable.

1:04:04 They've been able to, I mean all of her jewellery now has gone to

1:04:07 auction. Her clothing has been sold.

1:04:10 They've tried to recoup as much like their houses and their

1:04:13 penthouse and all this other stuff was sold and they've been

1:04:17 able to recoup. I think it was now as of

1:04:20 literally 2 days ago it is they've been able to recoup

1:04:24 $0.36 to the dollar of, of the investors money.

1:04:28 So they've been looking to try and recoup as much of this money

1:04:32 as possible because these people, this was their

1:04:36 retirement. They've got nothing left.

1:04:38 They're gonna have to work for, you know, a really long time to

1:04:41 try and recoup all of this money.

1:04:43 And so they're now looking into like, I guess in a way,

1:04:47 fraudulent tax payments that Melissa made under her company

1:04:52 Maliva, which were not legitimate because she never

1:04:57 like what she was submitting wasn't real.

1:05:00 So technically, that money that she's paid to the Ato was for

1:05:03 illegitimate payments. Yeah.

1:05:06 And yeah, they. So the Ato actually owe her

1:05:09 estate that money back. I can't find anywhere.

1:05:14 I can't find a dollar amount anywhere.

1:05:15 But apparently it's quite a significant amount of money.

1:05:18 So hopefully that'll give some more money.

1:05:21 Yeah, top it up a bit more. But I mean, people are still not

1:05:23 going to come out on top here, are they?

1:05:25 If they're, if they've already, how many years later, we're in

1:05:28 2024 now and they've only been able to recoup $0.36 to the

1:05:32 dollar. I mean, they're not going to be

1:05:34 able to get back all of her, you know, well, first class travel

1:05:37 and private jet money and all of the consumable she's she's

1:05:41 purchased so. Which, like, on that same front,

1:05:45 I mean, I in this Anthony is also collateral damage.

1:05:50 Absolutely. I mean, he didn't ask for this,

1:05:52 but at the same time he was involved with someone who was

1:05:55 doing some pretty dodgy shit. I don't know.

1:05:58 I was going to ask you what your thoughts are on this because

1:06:00 there was a Spotlight interview with him, which, check it out.

1:06:04 He got paid 50 grand for that. Yeah.

1:06:06 And I just don't think he should have been paid because there's

1:06:08 so much money being owed to all these investors that he

1:06:12 shouldn't be making money at. That's two to me.

1:06:15 Proposed time. Yeah, he should be making money

1:06:18 off of that. No, I, I.

1:06:19 The only issue with that is that he yes, I know this.

1:06:21 I'll say he he's take, he's obviously still looking after a

1:06:25 young son of Melissa's and you know that he is a great stepdad

1:06:30 to do that and take and take him on.

1:06:32 Although I believe there's another, there's still his

1:06:34 biological father who also should have access, but he he

1:06:38 needs to provide for him. But he can go out and get work

1:06:41 and be, he's a very good hairdresser.

1:06:43 He we worked for Joe Bailey. Joe Bailey.

1:06:44 Bailey breeds prawns, prawns the.

1:06:47 Prawns have got to be bringing some money.

1:06:48 Oh, and surely that DJ giggle bring him in with his 300, with

1:06:53 his 300 and 2020 views or whatever it is a.

1:06:57 Few more after I've been on there.

1:07:01 I've added added to the counter fair bit over the last week

1:07:03 while we've been researching. This really gets me in the mood.

1:07:06 Grab a wine, grab a wine and have a listen to the album.

1:07:10 It's it's comedy gold. I was just saying to Emma before

1:07:15 we started recording that it reminds me of my 7 year old son

1:07:18 who every night makes up a song for me and he so he will often

1:07:23 get out the the iPad and play a song and then he'll sing to it

1:07:26 and make his own music up. That, ladies and gentlemen, is

1:07:29 exactly what this 30 plus year old man, 40 year old man is

1:07:33 creating and and recording. I'm going to put it out there

1:07:36 because I've I've seen Brody's musical styling.

1:07:39 Yes, I'm going to say Brody's way better at it than Anthony

1:07:42 Coletti, hands down. Oh, it's it's.

1:07:45 Pure gold it is. It's great.

1:07:47 It's actually great, yeah. Yeah, man, have we?

1:07:51 Can I just tell you one of the this is another bit of like.

1:07:54 So do you know the name of his breeding company for his?

1:07:56 Prom. Oh no, I don't go slippery

1:07:59 little. Suckers.

1:08:00 What is wrong with that man? Ohh, that's great.

1:08:07 That's too good, too, too good. Alright, well, I guess that

1:08:11 brings us to the end of another episode for for this week.

1:08:15 So quick, so quick, yet you know.

1:08:19 I mean, there's so much more out there on this case, too.

1:08:21 I mean, it's. But, yeah, it's one without a

1:08:23 solid ending. Because it is.

1:08:26 Please tell us what you think. Yeah.

1:08:28 Did she commit, commit suicide? Was she murdered?

1:08:31 Is there something out there that we don't know about or what

1:08:35 lovely island is she hopping around on?

1:08:37 Yeah. Literally.

1:08:38 Literally. But yeah, just yet another piece

1:08:43 of shit though, stealing money off people.

1:08:44 I just can't. Stealing money off her friends

1:08:47 and family? That's OK.

1:08:49 We haven't even mentioned she did this to her own parents.

1:08:52 Yeah, that's awful. I really, that's just she she

1:08:56 really has dubbed them big time. They've come out OK, OK in this.

1:09:00 Now they've, they've had some pretty good lawyers themselves

1:09:03 and managed to get there, basically got get pretty much

1:09:06 all of their investment back, but not without the, you know,

1:09:09 the, the dividends and things that they probably would have

1:09:12 thought they were getting from any of this.

1:09:14 Yeah. And they thought they had a

1:09:15 place to live for life and now they don't.

1:09:17 That's it. Yeah.

1:09:19 So, yeah. Believable.

1:09:20 Yeah. All.

1:09:20 Right, well, next week we are going to be investigating and

1:09:24 having a chat about the Port Arthur massacre.

1:09:28 That's a really heavy. It's gonna be heavy.

1:09:29 Yeah. That's that's a big one, yeah.

1:09:31 So, yeah, if you, you know, stay tuned for that.

1:09:35 Yeah, we'd love to have you back next week.

1:09:38 Any feedback is more than welcome.

1:09:41 DMS on Instagram have a follow of us over on Tiktok.

1:09:46 We welcome any comments. And, you know, if you haven't

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1:09:55 So we'd really appreciate it if you could.

1:09:57 Yeah, hit the follow, hit the subscribe button on whatever app

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1:10:04 And it means that you get notification of our next

1:10:07 episode, which is always on Tuesdays.

1:10:09 Yep, Tuesday mornings love it. Yeah, love a Tuesday morning.

1:10:14 All right. Thanks everyone for joining us

1:10:15 for another episode and we'll see you next week.

1:10:17 See you next week, everyone. Stay curious.

1:10:20 Crime besties. What's your favorite song by

1:10:40 Pause on, No pause, pause off, sorry, pause off.

1:10:45 Who does? He think he is spent an

1:10:49 inordinate amount of time listening to his shit.

1:10:52 We're probably like the only people who've listened to his

1:10:54 albums since. I think we might be because oh,

1:10:57 it's a bit of a light out sound asleep.

1:11:07 OK. You ready, guys?

1:11:09 We're going to get up and then I'm going to go on two weeks

1:11:11 holiday, OK? And you go around the side,

1:11:17 we'll go around the front. Me, me, me, me, me.

1:11:19 No, no, no. We don't have any proof or any

1:11:21 efforts. No, no, we'll just get them.

1:11:24 Yeah, don't worry about them. I'm going on holidays soon.

1:11:28 Yeah. They've got millions of dollars

1:11:30 of jewelry, luxury items, clothes and everything.

1:11:34 I can't wait. Oh, yeah, That's good enough for

1:11:43 me. Oh my.

1:12:03 Did you just wake up like?