From the jail cells to business class for the 60 Minutes crew as they make their way home
BACK together after two weeks locked in cells, the 60 Minutes crew were greeted by warm towels, cold champagne and the best seats money could buy for their journey home.
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EXCLUSIVE
Back together after two weeks locked in cells far from home, Tara Brown and her 60 Minutes crew celebrated freedom with a round of Beirut Beer.
Sinking into couches in the luxurious Cedar airport lounge, they had their choice of all the fine food they could eat and all the beer and wine they could drink.
They chose a plate of falafels and Lebanese bread and tins of the local pilsner and embraced for a group photo with “relieved” Nine news director Darren Wick.
“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.
Wick, Rice, Williamson, reporter Tara Brown and sound man David Ballment then boarded an Emirates flight home to Sydney via Dubai.
They had gone straight to the airport after an investigative judge dropped charges against them over their botched child recovery mission.
Their release was secured after a deal with father Ali Elamine, who agreed to withdraw charges against the 60 Minutes team and his estranged wife Sally Faulkner for trying to snatch back the couple’s two children, 5 and 3.
But prosecutors still had to formally decide whether to drop state offences, and Mr Elamine had not agreed to withdraw charges against others involved in the mission.
Adam Whittington and Craig Michael from Child Abduction Recovery International and two Lebanese men remained behind bars.
Mr Elamine had taken his children from their Australian home to Lebanon for a holiday last May and did not return them.
The men from the 60 Minutes team had been held together in an underground cell designed for one person at the Baabda Palace of Justice.
Their freedom came in the back of a white van, which spirited them away from the courts to the nearby women’s prison, where they waited for Brown.
After a brief wait a smiling but silent Brown emerged and joined her colleagues in the back of the van.
The Nine network’s cameras were rolling as the vehicle did a circuit through Beirut streets, followed by a convoy of media crews in cars and on motorbikes.
Horns blared in the heavy traffic as they took the scenic route, probably to buy time, before making their way to the airport.
They drove straight through a VIP-only entrance with the assistance of Australian embassy officials, ending the pursuit.
Inside the airport they regrouped with Wick, who could finally see an end in sight for the team.
“Relief,” is how he described the feeling of securing their release.
All were under instruction from Nine not to talk about their ordeal.
“We’ve still got to do a debrief with these guys as well. They want to have their first conversation with their family,” Wick said.
Brown, wearing a striped blue and white top, black jeans and flats, looked drawn with dark circles under her eyes.
“Please appreciate we can’t talk. This is serious and we can’t talk about it,” she said.
Rice, wearing a collared light blue business shirt with his sleeves rolled up, added: “We’re all journos but unfortunately we’re just not in a position to say anything right now.”
It was left to bearded cameraman Ben Williamson, the youngest in the crew, to open a window to their feelings, acknowledging all were looking forward to seeing their worried families.
“We are all happy to be out,” he said.
The bedraggled bunch was quite the sight as they walked beneath the bright fluorescent lights.
Ballment, who looked to be in the worst health of the group, wore shoes that appeared to have had their laces removed as a prison security measure.
The first leg of their return journey was aboard a Boeing 777-200 before a quick changeover in Dubai to a hulking Airbus A380 for their 14-hour trip home.
Warm towels, cold champagne, fresh peanuts and the best seats money can buy greeted them at the front of the plane, a far cry from a cramped jail cell.
Originally published as From the jail cells to business class for the 60 Minutes crew as they make their way home
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