Australian couple Adriana Kupresak and Luka Matak accused of fraud in Croatia

An Australian couple who have rubbed shoulders with Sydney A-listers are now being held in a prison in Croatia after an alleged fraud that ripped off investors.

Travel blogger Adriana Matak (nee Kupresak), 36, and her investment advisor husband Luka Matak, 31, are accused of investment fraud.

Exclusive: An Australian couple who moved in elite social circles have been accused of fleecing investors of hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Travel blogger Adriana Matak, 36, and her investment advisor husband Luka Matak, 31, both formerly of Sydney, are being held in Remetinec prison in the Croatian capital Zagreb.

Adriana Matak, who uses her maiden name of Kupresak online, worked with the Croatian Tourist Board to spruik the island country as a holiday destination.

She was born in Croatia, but lived in Sydney from the age of one. Pictures show she rubbed shoulders with Sydney A-listers.

Her father was a Sydney United football player, Velimir Kupresak, who retired in 2001.

The couple were arrested after allegedly taking around 350,000 euro (A$587,000) from people with the promise of big returns.

Travel blogger Adriana Matak (Kupresak), 36, and her investment advisor husband Luka Matak, 31, both formerly of Sydney. Picture: Supplied

The couple have denied the allegations against them.

Authorities allege this has been occurring for a number of years with five confirmed alleged victims.

The couple – who are yet to be charged – deny the accusations and have told Croatian police there was no intention to cheat investors with any loss due to the risk of investment.

Croatian publication NI quoted Adriana Matak’s statement to investigators where she claimed her husband could not transfer the money from the brokerage account to a bank account in Croatia.

“Luka had that money, he just had to find a legal way to return it,” Mrs Matak said.

“Luka closed the sum of 600 thousand euros on a brokerage account and can send that money,” the statement read.

When police arrived at the couple’s home in the wealthy Salata neighbourhood they are said to have been greeted by security guards the couple hired.

“We offered reconciliation to one of the investors and proposed a repayment plan, but he started harassing us. He also created a website through which he harassed our friends,” Mrs Matak told police, according to N1.

Adriana with her father Velimir Kupresak at home in 2001 when his retirement was announced from the Sydney United soccer club with (L) Diana - 10yo and Ivana (2). Picture: Dean Marzolla.

On her blog, Mrs Matak said she had a secure job in Sydney, but loved Croatia too much to return.

“It’s a feeling money can’t buy and nothing gives me more anxiety than even contemplating a life back in Sydney, Australia. No, thank you. Even though I have a job waiting for me the second I land in Sydney, it’s secure and one I know like the back of my hand, I’d still feel lost and depressed,” she wrote.

She also detailed her battle with addiction.

“Sex, drugs and alcohol were my favourite distractions in the past,” she wrote, describing being sober and free of addictions after ‘carelessly tampering with drugs” for 11 years.

Adriana documented her travels and life on her blog where she detailed meeting her husband on Tinder.

“The following day I went back on Tinder and saw my husband’s profile. I noticed he was also from Sydney and figured, “Great, I need a normal western guy to bitch about Croatian guys to.” I swiped right. We matched instantly. Started chatting instantly, met up a few hours later and have been inseparable ever since that day,” she wrote.

Company records show that Mr Matak was born in western Sydney suburb Bankstown in 1992.

Mrs Matak said she loved living in Croatia, even though life in Sydney was easier.

Between 2017 and 2019 he was a director of Australian company ADLM Capital, as well as owning half the company.

It was wound up by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission in August 2019 for failing to lodge documents or pay fees on time.

He has also been involved with business in the UK, where he is the director and owner of a company called TMG Private Wealth.

Mrs Matak did work for the Croation Tourism Board.

Mr Matak, who describes himself in UK company documents as a “hedge fund director”, also owned another British company called Hedgehog Capital, which was dissolved in April.

The Croatian Tourist Board have distanced themselves from Adriana, insisting she was only paid once, when she wrote an article for HuffPost.

“The Croatian Tourist Board made its first contact with Adriana Matak, then Kuprešak, in 2015 during the presentation of the communication concept ‘Full of Life’ in London. Adriana attended this event at the invitation of a partner PR agency from the United Kingdom market as one of the travel bloggers and collaborators of British portals,” spokesperson Dario Trnka told a Croatian publication.

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Originally published as Australian couple Adriana Kupresak and Luka Matak accused of fraud in Croatia