60 Minutes crew, Tara Brown, mum Sally Faulkner released from Beirut prison
LATEST: DID he or didn’t he? The father in the 60 Minutes saga insists he has received no payment for the release deal — but reports suggest otherwise.
TARA Brown and the 60 Minutes crew have left prison and flown out of Lebanon after a deal was struck, thanks to a teary-eyed plea from Channel Nine cameraman Ben Williamson.
Back together after two weeks locked in cells far from home, the team celebrated freedom with a round of Beirut Beer at Beirut international airport before boarding an Emirates flight for a First Class trip home to Sydney via Dubai.
“We’re happy to have our first beer, how about that,” was producer Stephen Rice’s only comment about the dramatic fortnight that has put careers on the line at Nine.
They made quick their escape from a Lebanese prison, heading directly to the airport after Nine apparently paid a seven-figure compensation deal to free them.
The rumoured $1 million ransom paid to Ali Elamine, the ex-husband of Brisbane mum Sally Faulkner, turned the wheels of justice quickly - with lawyers acting for the Nine Network settling the payment at 9pm (AEST) and the three-man crew of Williamson, producer Stephen Rice and sound man David Ballment the first to leave prison just two hours later.
COMING HOME: A luxurious end for the 60 Minutes crew
COSTLY AFFAIR: Nine’s $1m deal - will it pay off?
DONE DEAL: Surf’s up for Ali Elamine amid 60 Minutes storm
FINALLY FREE: Families relieved 60 Minutes ordeal over
Speaking to Nine on their way to the airport in a mini-van, Brown said she couldn’t wait to be reunited with her family.
“I have had a chance to say hi to John (her husband),” she said.
“I was ordered to call home straight away. Not the kids yet and I can’t wait to speak to them, though they have no idea about any of this. It’s great to talk to home, it is great to be going home,” the experienced reporter said.
Ms Faulkner, travelling in the van with the crew, also expressed relief to be going home.
“I’m just so glad to be out of there,” she said.
“It’s the uncertainty that kept me awake; not knowing if it was going to be a lifelong sentence or what.”
Rice said their release came unexpectedly.
“An hour ago we were sitting in a very, very small cell. This has come completely out of the blue,” he said.
“I think we are all hoping for the best but prepared for the worst. I’ll hug my wife and kids and tell them I love them.”
Child Abduction Recovery Network boss Adam Whittington and fellow Briton Craig Michael remain in jail, with their lawyer questioning the ethics of the Australian network.
Joe Karam said: “They came together, they should leave together.”
According to news.com.au, when asked if they would help the detained members of the child recovery group a Nine spokeswoman said: “We had no contractual relationship with them in the first place and still have no obligations to them”.
But Mr Karam has promised to release receipts showing the Nine Network directly paid the agency for the kidnapping operation.
Addressing the media at a press conference, Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop said Mr Whittington travelled into Lebanon on a British passport and as such Lebanese authorities where communicating with UK authorities.
“We have provided and have offered consular support to him as we have the other Australian citizens detained,” she said.
Ms Bishop said she was “very pleased” to learn of the release of the 60 Minutes crew.
“I received a phone call late yesterday afternoon from the Lebanese Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil,” she said.
“He has kept me informed of proceedings throughout and I have discussed the matter with him.
“We’ve shared ideas and he has kept me updated on proceedings and he informed me that he understood the 60 Minutes crew would be released and able to return home.”
Asked about reports the Nine Network paid a large sum to secure the release of Ms Faulkner and the 60 Minutes crew, Ms Bishop said she was not “aware of the details” of the deal.
She said she believed Ms Faulkner was staying in Lebanon to see her children.
Dad says he got no payment
ALI Elamine has denied he has received any payment from Channel 9 over the 60 Minutes child recovery saga.
Mr Elamine has told 3AW he has received no money from the network to assist with the release of his ex-partner Sally Faulkner and a 60 Minutes crew including reporter Tara Brown.
“No, that’s not true because I haven’t seen anything or signed (anything),” he told 3AW.
“I heard I got $10 million from one source, from one TV station and I thought: ‘Really? Wow.
“I haven’t got anything. I’ve supposedly got Sal signing off on the custody of the kids, and that’s worth more than anything to me.”
He added: “Trust me, I wouldn’t mind if they would cough up something but, like I said, I never talked about anything or never indicated anything that regarding money or any of that. My main concern was to get the custody of the kids.”
But according to news.com.au, a Nine spokeswoman confirmed that some compensation was paid to the father to help secure their release but would not comment on how much money changed hands.
“There was compensation as announced by the judge, we are not discussing details,” the spokeswoman said.
Ms Faulkner’s lawyer, Ghassan Moghabghab, told Channel Seven he had no part in hashing out the finances of a deal and wasn’t aware if a payment had been made.
“I was negotiating with Ali Elamine. The agreement we have signed, there was no payment about that,” he said.
Mr Elamine, who is reportedly from a high-profile, wealthy family in Lebanon, had previously said monetary compensation held no appeal for him.
However high-profile Lebanese Australian doctor Jamal Rifi, who was asked by Nine to help broker negotiations with Mr Elamine, said he had asked for money a few days earlier.
“I honestly still don’t know if any money has changed hands or not,” he told Channel Seven.
“But to my knowledge, a couple of days ago, he did ask for a sum of money.”
Mr Elamine told 3AW the judge persuaded him to relax his stance on charges for the 60 Minutes crew.
“The judge was saying that technically the TV crew on the ground was not there when the kidnapping took place, they were reporting it, so the charges against them were a lot lenient, and He said that if I agreed with that, it would just look better for the Lebanese-Australian communities and all of that,” he said.
“They’re talking politically about all of this.
“The main guys that made me feel bad for the crew were Stephen (Rice) and David (Ballment). They seemed like a couple of good dudes.”
Mr Elamine said he’s relieved the drama is over.
“I don’t think anyone is a winner and I don’t think anyone is a loser,” Mr Elamine said.
“I wouldn’t say I’ve won a result.
“I mean, I think there is an agreement that I think is best for everyone – the kids, Sally and all of that with the custody issues.
“I don’t know. I guess I’m happy, happy that it’s over.”
Sally Faulkner will get to see the children before she returns to Australia, Mr Elamine said.
“One hundred per cent. She’s going to see them tomorrow because, with all the procedures that happened today, I didn’t want them to see her in cuffs or at a jail cell or something like that, because the kids don’t know what’s happening.”
He said he bears no ill will to Ms Faulkner, who he said was just a mother who was “lost in her own thoughts”.
“Everything I did with dropping the case against Sal … was for the kids.
“As they’ll get older, they’ll go, ‘Yeah, Daddy, you dropped your personal side of things and Mummy was out’.
“She would look like a bad person but they will see that everyone tried their best to hold on to the best.”
But he said that, at this stage, there is no prospect his daughter and son will not be visiting their mother in Australia.
“At the moment, no. I would like to see things settle down. I want their mum to kind of settle down, take it all in, realise what has happened and then, a few years down the line, yeah, why not?”.
I was lured away from my kids, says dad
IN an interview on The Kyle and Jackie O Show, Mr Elamine said he believes he was deliberately lured away from his kids on the day the kidnap attempt took place.
Mr Elamine, who owns a surf school in Lebanon, said he was contacted by a client who insisted on a 7am surf lesson.
Mr Elamine said he tried to reschedule to avoid a clash with taking his children to school.
But he eventually relented, leaving his elderly mother to escort Lahela, 5, and Noah, 3.
“They did a run on Tuesday and saw me with the kids and it never went through because they figured I’d fight back,” Mr Elamine told the Kiss FM program.
“They figured if they get me away an older lady in her 70s and her helper are not going to be much of a threat to a 6ft 3in guy.”
Mr Elamine said his mother had suffered a concussion and internal bleeding from the incident.
“She’s a 70-year-old lady who got chucked around like she was a bag of chips,” he said.
Mr Elamine said he cut off communications with the children’s Australian mother Sally Faulkner after he saw emails that indicated she was planning to take the children.
“She was trying to orchestrate like a kidnapping - a bunch of mercenaries to come in,” he added.
“I told her to stop whatever you’re doing because you’re jeopardising our safety.
“She was kind of trying to pinpoint our every move every time she Skyped the kids and that’s when I said, ‘We can’t communicate with you’.”
He also told Kyle and Jackie O he decided to take the the children after he “saw a few things happening in regards to Sal’s parenting or relationships”.
“Lahela kept on telling me that mommy’s friend was sleeping in the same bed that we were, that mommy’s friend was always around. And I just wasn’t OK with that,” he claimed, referring to his estranged wife’s new partner
Faulkner doesn’t blame 60 Minutes: lawyer
Sally Faulkner’s lawyer says his freed client doesn’t blame the 60 Minutes crew for her imprisonment over the botched abduction of her children in Lebanon.
Her lawyer, Ghassan Moghabghab, told Channel Seven Ms Faulkner does not hold the Nine Network or the crew responsible.
“No, not at all. Because, they helped her in a way or another to pay the company who issue the action in Beirut,” he said.
“They wanted to get the scoop and they paid everything to help Sally try to reach her children.
“If she wants to blame somebody, I think she should blame the company that made up the job. It was an unprofessional job.”
Nine launches review into 60 Minutes saga
IN an email to staff this morning, Nine chief executive Hugh Marks expressed the “enormous relief” for all involved in the 60 Minutes saga.
“As you would all by now be aware our 60 Minutes team, together with Brisbane mother Sally Faulkner, are out of detention and on their way home. It is an enormous relief for all involved but particularly the families and loved ones of our 60 Minutes team who have suffered a great deal over these last two weeks,” he said.
Mr Marks defended the actions of the team saying they never intended to breach the law.
He said: “It is important to reiterate that at no stage did anyone from Nine or 60 Minutes intend to act in any way that made them susceptible to charges that they breached the law or to become part of the story that is Sally’s story. But we did become part of the story and we shouldn’t have.”
He said Nine will conduct a full review that will be headed by Gerald Stone, with David Hurley and General Counsel Rachel Launders, “to ascertain what went wrong and why our systems, designed to protect staff, failed to do so in this case.”
“We will task the review with recommending the necessary actions to ensure that none of our colleagues are put in a similar position in the future,” he said.
He continued: “This has been an extraordinarily stressful time for the crew and for their families and I want to very publicly acknowledge how much they have been through and thank them for their courage, their perseverance and for the trust they placed in us to resolve events.”
Mr Marks said Sally Faulkner’s story was “in the public interest”.
“What has happened to Sally happens all too often and affects thousands of Australian families. It is a story that not only is profoundly in the public interest but also one the public is interested in. It’s an issue that we will continue to highlight,” he said.
Koch: Should Nine be investigated for bribery?
Meanwhile, Treasurer Scott Morrison this morning refused to be drawn on whether the Australian Securities and Investment Commission would investigate Channel Nine, during a television interview with the network’s chief rival Channel Seven.
Sunrise presenter David Koch questioned Mr Morrison on whether the financial sector regulator should launch a probe to determine if the Nine Network paid a bribe to get Ms Faulkner and the 60 Minutes crew out of jail.
Koch: “Nine is a publicly listed company. You run the Australian Securities and Investment Commission that comes under your portfolio. If a bribe was paid, should ASIC be investigating Channel Nine?”
Morrison: “Well, David, you are making a lot of assumptions about a number of facts there. And I am not going to do that this morning. I think what today we are pleased about is Miss Fawkner is coming home as are other Australians coming home. I think the lesson here is this: if you go to another country and you engage in behaviour which could be considered a criminal act in those countries, the Australian law won’t protect you over there. The other lesson is, child custody disputes are always heartbreaking for everyone involved. And particularly for children and there are never any real winners from that. I am pleased they are coming home. Other matters are speculation at the moment and I don’t think it assists me as Treasurer or any others to be speculating on these events.”
Koch: “But the corporate cop is part of your responsibility.”
Morrison: “ASIC is.”
Koch continued: “Channel Nine is a publicly-listed company, it comes under that. If a bribe was paid, or a kidnapping attempt paid for by a publicly listed company, should ASIC be investigating to get to the bottom of it?”
Morrison: “David, I am not going to respond to hypotheticals. I don’t think that you think I should.”
Koch: “Well, we know the kidnapping was. That is a fact.”
Morrison: “David, these are facts that others would have to determine before we could answer those questions.”
Koch: “Should ASIC …”
Morrison: “David, I am not going to try this case on morning television. That’s why we have ASIC and other agencies to do that.”
Opposition Leader Bill Shorten said it was a matter for ASIC.
“What has been overlooked in the debate was the very difficult area of law where one partner takes children overseas and the other can’t see them,” he told radio 3AW.
‘Smiles as wide as the Harbour Bridge’
Nine’s European correspondent Tom Steinfort confirmed the release of his male colleagues, describing their “smiles as wide as the Harbour Bridge”.
Within half an hour, Brown joined them in a waiting van which whisked all four directly to Beirut airport and flights bound for Australia.
They still face state charges in relation to the April 6 kidnapping and will be expected to return to Lebanon for any future criminal prosecution, the prosecuting judge Rami Abdullah said.
Mr Elamine, who spent much of the time that his children’s mother was in prison surfing, continued to deny he was to be paid.
Faulkner has agreed to relinquish all custodial rights to her two eldest children, five-year-old Lahela and three-year-old Noah, involved in the botched operation, grant Mr Elamine a divorce and give up any custodial applications in the Australian Family Court.
It is understood Ms Faulkner will return home after the TV team, following one final, anguished farewell with her children, a meeting agreed upon in the terms of the court settlement before she has to relinquish custody rights to their father.
She will be able to visit the children in Lebanon or an agreed third country, but not Australia.
However Mr Elamine maintained his personal charges against the planner of the operation, Adam Whittington and his crew, Craig Michael, Mohammed Hamza and Khaled Barbour.
Mr Elamine said he decided to drop the charges against the 60 Minutes crew because the judge felt that they were not personally responsible for the kidnapping at the southern Beirut bus stop and that he felt “a man to man kinship” with Ballment and Williamson in particular.
Three of the crew were not at the scene when the kidnap took place.
Authorities in Beirut have been told the network paid $115,000 directly or indirectly for the recovery operation to go ahead.
“Ben (Williamson) was a bit emotional and the sound recordist too and I put myself in their place, Ben was frustrated because he wasn’t seeing his own kids and I felt bad about that,’’ Mr Elamine said.
Mr Elamine’s lawyer Hussein Barjawi said the deal did not involve money and that Mr Elamine had dropped the charges on compassionate grounds.
“It’s because she is the mum of his kids,” Mr Berjawi said.
“It’s based on the request of the children he will ask for her release.”
Nine news director Darren Wick, who has been waging diplomatic war behind-the-scenes to free his staffers on the ground in Lebanon, beamed for the first time in 10 days, telling colleagues back in Sydney he was “over the moon.”
However Faulkner, Brown and the 60 Minutes crew may have to return to Lebanon and potentially face further kidnapping and conspiracy charges from the state.
Judge Rami Abdullah said he was still investigating the case despite the 60 Minutes crew and Faulkner being released on bail following the dropping of the charges by Mr Elamine and his mother Ibtissma Berri.
“A crime has happened and everyone has a role in this affair,” Judge Abdullah said.
“I will decide after my consideration.”
The judge insisted that if formal charges were laid the crew had to return in person to Lebanon to face the charges.
“If they don’t they will be outlawed and charged in absentia,” he warned.
Judge Abdullah is expected to finish his investigation within several weeks and then make a recommendation to the prosecutor about the specific indictments faced by everyone involved.
There were signs of jubilation in the corridors of the Baabda Palace of Justice outside Judge Abdullah’s rooms when the deal was finally lodged.
Channel Nine’s lawyer Kamal Abu Zahr hugged the Australian diplomat Maggie Nunan.
Nine’s director of news, Darren Wick, appeared relaxed and relieved that the ordeal of his staff was coming to an end.
Families back in Australia were said to be ecstatic at the news of their release.
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