An award-winning ABC reporter passed on menacing messages from an organised crime gang to journalists, one of whom became so fearful he reported the matter to police.
“These people kill people,” Mahmood Fazal, 33, a former outlaw bikie gang member turned Four Corners reporter, is alleged to have told Kristo Langker, a producer and researcher who works with popular YouTube figure Jordan Shanks, known online as FriendlyJordies.
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McBride was this morning sentenced to five years and eight months in jail, with a non-parole period of two years and three months. His lawyer said they would appeal.
Kidfluencers
Monday 20 May 8:30pm
It’s the age of social media influencers, and Australian kids are getting on board.
Encouraged by their parents, they’re filling our feeds, vying to be the next big thing. But can children ever really consent? And who’s watching?
Reporters Jessica Longbottom and Carla Hildebrandt meet the parents who say they’re setting up their kids’ future careers.
But there’s a darker side to this new and unregulated world.
Four Corners investigates one online platform where potential predators can pay for photos of children and asks the tech companies what they’re doing to keep young people safe.
Four Corners: Kidfluencers will air at 8.30pm on Monday 20 May 2024 on ABC TV and ABC iview. See more at abc.net.au/news and on ABC News social media platforms.
Kidfluencers feature articles
It’s just sick. A 4 year old influencer? Child abuse.
The federal government will ban all compounding pharmacists from making replica versions of diabetes drugs like Ozempic and Mounjaro, widely used off-label for weight loss, amid public safety concerns.
It comes after a Four Corners investigation found a registered Australian pharmacist was running an international pharmaceutical racket manufacturing replica Ozempic and illegally exporting it to the United States.
Federal health minister Mark Butler today announced that loophole would be closed from October, when compounding of the active ingredients in drugs like Ozempic would be removed from the exemptions.
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Boeing’s Fatal Flaw
Monday 27 May 8:30pm
“I opened my eyes to a giant hole in the plane.”
New, tough questions are being asked about Boeing’s 737 Max, the fastest-selling jet in the iconic company’s history.
After being involved in two crashes that killed 346 people, the troubled commercial aeroplane was forced to make an emergency landing this year after a door plug blew out and a passenger was nearly sucked out of it.
This special update to an award-winning investigation from PBS Frontline and The New York Times investigates the plane’s commercial pressures, flawed design and failed oversight.
What a shame I watched this on YouTube the other week.
We are really seeing the effects of the budget cuts with a lot of Four Corners episodes being purchased content.
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Breaking Free
Monday 3 June 8:30 pm
"We take the men no-one else takes."Australia has one of the highest reoffending rates in the world. Every year, We take the men no-one else takes."
Australia has one of the highest reoffending rates in the world.
Every year, 19,000 people leave prison in New South Wales, but less than three per cent of them get a bed in a supported accommodation program.
Reporter Linton Besser meets the lucky few who’ve been given a place at Sydney’s Rainbow Lodge – one of the longest continually running halfway houses in the world.
These men have committed multiple crimes and been in and out of prison for decades. Most have been cast out from their families in the process.
For many, the lodge’s three-month program is their last chance to take responsibility for their actions and prove they’re ready for the outside world – but one slip-up could land them back inside.
Four Corners: Breaking Free, will air from 8.30pm on Monday 3 June 2024 on ABC TV and ABC iview. See more at abc.net.au/news and on ABC News social media platforms.
Wind Wars
Monday 10 June 8:30pm
Wind power is essential for Australia to meet its green energy targets — but we’re not even halfway there and the issue is becoming increasingly politicised.
A new climate battle is now raging, pitting nature conservation against wind farms. It’s fracturing communities and leading to old enemies forming new alliances.
Four Corners reporter Angus Grigg travels to a community where an ambitious proposal to build a wind farm is dividing residents.
In another community he meets the climate change denier and environmentalist who are teaming up, and he investigates the next frontier for clean energy — giant wind turbines offshore.
Sydney private school Cranbrook has reached an undisclosed settlement with former headmaster, Nicholas Sampson, and acknowledged the basis for his resignation “may have caused confusion”.
Mr Sampson said he had also lodged a “detailed complaint with the ABC Ombudsman concerning reporting by the Four Corners program”.
Infiltrating Australia – India’s secret war
Monday 17 June 8:30pm
Narendra Modi has ruled India for a decade and will continue his reign following this month’s election, but he does not tolerate some critics.
His government has been accused of political interference and assassinating dissidents overseas — and now Four Corners has uncovered the long arm of the Indian state here in Australia.
The ABC’s former South Asia correspondent Avani Dias reveals new details about the local “nest of spies” previously disrupted by ASIO and meets the Australian residents who say they have been threatened by India’s authorities.
For the first time, she also reveals the full story of what happened earlier this year when things got personal and she was told her Indian visa wouldn’t be renewed ahead of the election.
Four Corners: Infiltrating Australia, will air at 8.30pm on Monday 17 June 2024 on ABC TV and ABC iview. See more at abc.net.au/news and on ABC News social media platforms.
Avani Dias has co-written a feature article on the issue for ABC News website.
When IVF goes wrong
Monday 24 June 8:30pm
“People need to know … this is the company you’re getting into bed with.”
One in every 18 births in Australia is now a result of IVF. It’s a multi-million-dollar industry creating ‘miracle babies’.
But when things go wrong, who is holding these fertility clinics to account?
Four Corners reporter Grace Tobin investigates incidents of the wrong sperm being used to conceive children, a serial donor with potentially 700 offspring, and a lab contamination that destroyed precious embryos.
She meets the women and their partners fighting back against the corporate giants – teaming up to get access to their own medical information and going to whatever lengths it takes to force clinics to put patients before profits.
Four Corners: When IVF goes wrong, will air at 8.30pm on Monday 24 June 2024 on ABC TV and ABC iview.
See more at abc.net.au/news and on ABC News social media platforms.
Inside China’s Tech Boom
Monday 1 July 8:30pm
From solar power to 5G, China has transformed into a science and technology superpower in just a few decades — but how exactly does China innovate?
This documentary, from the American public broadcaster PBS, gets rare access inside the companies, labs and factories that are driving China’s meteoric rise to the forefront of global innovation, including tech giant Huawei.
As a tech war between China and the West heats up, US-based journalist and podcaster Kaiser Kuo — who spent 20 years in China — investigates what drives its bid for technological supremacy, and what it means for the future of the global economy.
Four Corners: Inside China’s Tech Boom, will air from 8.30pm on Monday 1 July on ABC TV and ABC iview.
Sex Tourism — My father’s secret
Monday 8 July at 8:30pm
Sex work is big business in the Philippines, but with contraception often not used in the country and abortion illegal, there can be long term consequences.
Men from overseas — including Australia and New Zealand — are estimated to have fathered tens of thousands of children to sex workers. Most of the children have never been acknowledged and have been raised in poverty.
Now, thanks to a trailblazing Australian-led project, the children’s DNA is being used to identify their sex-tourist fathers, track them down, and demand child support.
In a co-production with the UK’s Clover Films, Four Corners meets the children, their mums, and the dad-hunters as they find the missing men and hold them to account.
Four Corners: Sex Tourism — My father’s secret, will air from 8.30pm on Monday 8 July on ABC TV and ABC iview.
Reporter: Grace Tobin is a multi-award-winning investigative journalist for Four Corners. Her work has prompted two royal commissions and led to the ban of a potentially fatal restraint in youth detention centres. Her previous Four Corners stories include an investigation into Australia’s IVF industry and a documentary following pregnant women struggling with drug addiction.
The Sunday Telegraph reports today that the Four Corners investigation into the toxic culture at a number of Sydney newsrooms is almost complete. The article says that Louise Milligan was seen recording a piece to camera outside Seven’s Eveleigh headquarters last week.
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