60 Minutes: Explosive emails reveal program chiefs, Nine lawyer knew about plot to ‘snatch the kids’

EXPLOSIVE emails have revealed that the two most senior staff at 60 Minutes knew details of the plan to abduct mother Sally Faulkner’s two children on the streets of Beirut months before it took place.

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THE two most senior staff at 60 Minutes and a Nine Network legal counsel knew significant details of the plan to abduct Brisbane mother Sally Faulkner’s two children on the streets of Beirut months before it took place, internal Nine emails reveal.

The emails from January this year — including two from current 60 Minutes executive producer

Kirsty Thomson to both former executive producer Tom Malone and sacked producer Stephen Rice on January 18, and another by Rice to an in-house lawyer one day later — outlined detailed discussions of a plan to snatch the children.

The abduction plan was initially scheduled for late February, but ultimately took place in April.

Journalist Tara Brown at the 60 Minutes offices in Willoughby yesterday / Picture: Tim Hunter

Two of the explosive 60 Minutes emails.

CCTV footage captured the moment contractors hired by Sally Faulkner allegedly abducting her children from their Lebanese grandmother.

The emails reveal:

● THOMSON, at that point 60 Minutes’ chief of staff, on January 18 made clear to Malone and Rice her interest in taking over a story shelved by another Nine program Inside Story that involved “snatching” Ms Faulkner’s “4 and 6 yo children from their father in Lebanon”. The email continued: “Father lives in Beirut and runs a surfing business. Classic ‘the kids aren’t coming home’ after holiday”;

● FAULKNER had been talking to Child Abduction Recovery International boss Adam Whittington “for months” about the abduction plan, a fact Thomson made clear in an email;

The 60 Minutes crew on their way home to Australia ... Ben Williamson, Stephen Rice, Tara Brown and David Ballment / Picture: Liam Kidston.

● MALONE and Rice were told by Thomson on January 18 that Inside Story had already proposed a detailed payment plan for “$115,000”, with $69,000 paid upfront, for “CARI to snatch the kids, escape via water (jetskis) to a boat and then on to Cyprus”. Just four days after her email was sent, $69,000 was paid on behalf of Nine into Whittington’s bank account;

● THOMSON’S email then proceeded to outline the timing of the abduction and further logistics that had been planned by Inside Story. “Organised for the last week of Feb,” it states. “Stage one surveillance is 3-5 days watching the family routine and planning the raid.”;

● A PROPOSAL by Thomson for a freelance producer at Inside Story to talk to Faulkner about “the possibility of doing something” with 60 Minutes. In a later email on January 18, it is made clear the freelance producer made the call. However, Thomson said in that email: “I’ve made it very clear we are by no means a definite.”;

● ONE day later, Rice briefed a senior Nine Network legal counsel about a plan for CARI “to snatch the kids and get on a boat to Cyprus”; and

● IN the same email to the legal counsel, Rice said: “We need to draw up a contract with her, which would include payment to CARI.” Just over an hour later, legal counsel replied to acknowledge the email.

Ali Al-Amin with children Lahlea and Noah / Facebook

Mother Sally Faulkner / Picture: AP

Kirsty Thompson, executive producer of 60 Minutes / Picture: Renee Nowytarger

Contacted for comment about the emails last night, a Nine spokeswoman said a scathing internal review into the bungle had not actually disputed the value of conducting the Faulkner story.

“There was no sense in the findings that we shouldn’t do a story about a mother trying to be reunited with her children. It’s just in the pursuing of it, things have gone wrong,” she said.

Stephen Rice, right, and journalist Tara Brown, middle arrive back in Australia after being released from prison in Beruit / AFP

The spokeswoman pointed to a finding in the internal review that there was “a significant level of autonomy for producers, without adequate oversight by management on issues that raised significant risks to Nine”.

Another part of the report noted “a query raised by one of Nine’s internal lawyers about making a payment directly to CARI was discounted by the producer (on the basis that payments to third parties had been done before) and so the issue was not escalated”.

While Rice was sacked and named as the main person responsible last Friday, Thomson, Malone and 60 Minutes reporter Tara Brown were only censured for the fiasco.

The Telegraph revealed yesterday Rice had hired workplace lawyer John Laxon ahead of a potential legal stoush.

60 Minutes report fallout.