First off, I feel a little slefish given whats going on in the world. My problems pale in comparison to what so many people are going through and whats to come in the weeks and months ahead.
But here it is.
In 2017 my wife and I packed up our lives and possessions to move overseas with a new life and a new start. It was well planned and we were very excited at our prospects. Long story short, we went to stay with her parents for what was meant to be about 4-5 days, fast forward nearly 3 years and we're still here and whats happened during that time would make anyones head spin.
We're still at the inlaws because due to a series of catasrophic events, we ended up losing everything. We had packed clothes and our laptops to last the 3-4 weeks untill the container arrived at our destination (i'm deliberately being vague with details, i'll answer questions anyone has to the best of my ability but also to maintain anonymity). We've been wearing the same t-shirts and shorts for nearly 3 years.
Before we got married, K told me that she had money overseas that she sent to a friend to look after while she was going through a really bad time involving her ex, she got in trouble with the law and did time in prison. She's as straight as a die and clean as a whistle but has impulse issues, and when she was backed in a corner she made some foolish, impulsive descisions that haunts her and her/our lives to this day.
I never thought much about her money, a part of me didnt completely buy it because its such a large amount and to be honest it sounded kind f far fetched. Besides, I was extremely successful in my profession, I was in a highly specialised field and was at the top of my game and financially killing it and enjoyed being self sufficiant. But when these cataclysmic events occurred and we were well and truly up the creek I said that if its true and you do have this money, lets tapp into it to get us out of the weeds.
The deal was, with her benefactor, who is a high profile buisinessman that she became friends with yeras ago, was that he would manage the money and it was essentially put into a trust and to protect her from the ex, who is a serious peice of work, would mature at a predetermined date, being her 50th bday. Any efforts or inquiries into the fund outside of the managers would result in the dissolving of the trust to predetermined charities. Turns out the ex got wind of this from the beginning and had been trying for the last 12 years to get his hands on it. Luckily the benefactor (I'll call him Don) knew what was going on and protected the fund while keeping the ex (call him Bill) at bay.
I appologise for this being a bit of an essay, I'm trying to keep it as short as I can while still making sense.
So we contacted Don and he agreed to release some of the funds so we could get on our feet. The balls that were put in motion as a result is what has put us where we are today.
Turns out the fund members, all big wig buisinessmen and women, indeed tuned the sum of money into a significant amount over the 12 or so yeras the fund was being managed. But the also used it as a personal slush fund for themselves, enriching themselves and and using it as collatoral for various ventures. The fund wasnt in my wifes name, simply to protect her and keep her far enough removed that if Bill came looking he'd get the bums steer. It was buried beneath various comapnies and powers of attorneys so as not to be traced back to her, save the official paperwork that was kept in a safe deposit box in Switzerland. (told you you wouldnt believe me).
As a result of all fo this, criminal investigations were underway, several members were charged and it was looking quite ugly. We told Don that we didnt want to pursue any charges and would let it go and let everyone off if we could just get back what was stolen. Fine. No worries, a lot of relieved businessmen.
So we were promosed this that and the other and that Don was sending money to us that never arrived. Excuse after excuse and lie after lie we were left waiting for about 6 months, every week we were told "next week" that cash would arrive but nevcer did.
Eventually, we took it out of the hands of Don and got a major international accountancy firm involved, they were happy to take over, it was a big acount for them. Their head office is the same city where Don is, and here we go, turns out that when they did a full audit, they found the misappropriation and criminality of the board of members. And better yet, a lot of the members were long standing clients of the firm. So suddenly they're running interference to protect their clients. We didnt know this for months, just that things had stalled and we werent getting anywhere. People wouldnt return emails or phone calls, we thought they (the firm) had just pinched the money and had run off with it.
Months later we had manged to get a senior partner involved that was outraged about the situation and stepped in to take over and resolve the issue. We thought all our Xmas's had come at once and we again started planning for our future. Boy were we naive.
At first this woman, Helen was her name, was extremely helpful and told us everything that had happened and was happening, told us who had been fired, and lots of people were fired because of this, also company procedures had to be rewritten and protocol had to be changed. But what it all boiled down to was their legal department stepped in to protect themselves and communication ground to a halt.
During all this, the money from the fund had all been liquidated, mostly tied up in realestate, and put in a bank account. Helen arranged the transfer of some cash to the wifes bank account here. As is the way here in Aus, any amount over AUD$10K is held by AUSTRAC and investigsted against illegal avenues: money laundering, drug trafficing etc, you might remeber the disaster with Westpac last year, with 29 million breaches of AUSTRAC laws in regards to mostly child pornography but also money laundering, but thats what they do, and a good thing too, if you ask me.
So AUSTRAC had what ended up being about AUD$4.7 million of our money, just the tip of the iceburg, doing their thing, investigating, auditing, also auditing on behalf of the ATO incase we owed them money, which we didnt. They gave the all clear but just wouldnt release the money. Turns out, Bill, the ex has a very long reach and friends in high places, including management at AUSTRAC and had people pulling strings to tie up the money, ideally so he could get his hands on it, but other than that, make sure that we couldnt. Bare in mind that we are flat broke. Dont have 2 cents to rub together. I csnt work because my line of work is highly specialised, with expensive tech equipment and I need to be located in the city but the inlaws live rurally and we're quite isolated. And I havent gotten a dodgy job at a bakery or something because since this all strted weve been told "you'll have it next week" so why would you get a job when money's on its way???. I know it sounds insane but thats how its been.
Anyway, we eventually got this before a Federal Judge who ruled in our favour, that AUSTRAC were out of line and that they release the funds immediately. Which they did. But:
We're under an NDA so I cant go into details about who or what, but the bank that we were with received the money from AUSTRAC and still to this day has not released it. We have the remittence from AUSTRAC and the recipt from "the bank" from early October last year but they point blank refuse to release the money. While I cant go into details, I can say some things.
Guess who's pulling strings? Yep. Bill. Things went very sour with the accounting firm and they ended up pulling all support and litterally dumping us while this is all going on. We went back to Don, hat in hand appealing for help and bless him, he stepped up and has been unbelieveably helpful still to this day. Being the kind of guy he is, he has heavy hitting legal representation and his personal lawyer has been representing us since about November. He's pretty much the best of the best, but what is apparent is that the big banks really are a pack of thieves that genuinely believe they're not only above the law but that the laws dont apply to them.
As of Friday, we were told that resolution from the bank is due this week, but weve been told that since December and we've been left with nothing. We went through Xmas and New Year without a cent to our names, relying on recycling soft drink cans and beer bottles to feed ourselves and out pets (a little dog and a cat, bless them). To date, 23 bank employees as well as the entire board of directors have been charged with multiple criminal offenses, yes you read that right plus a muli-million dollar compensation payout has been "agreed to" but they're still stalling.
Its not about the money, it never was. The fact that so much is in play is one thing, and yes, we do stand to be very well off but right now, I cant imagine even having undies that dont have holes in them. The hardest part about all of this is the being held at arms length and lack of information. The lawyer is not her in Australia and theres a major time difference and we dont have direct comminication with him, everything goes through Don and getting straight answers is sometimes difficult, especially since he has an entire empire to run an we muxt be such a thorn in his side. He feels guilty that it all started with him, which I think is why he's doing what hes doing, but for us its been 2 steps forward and 5 backwards. We've been at breaking point for about a year now, and we're being told that we are "this close" to it all being over but I dont knwo about that.
I dont expect anyone to feel sorry for me/us. One thing I've learned is that when money is involved people get unbelievably and unreasonably jealous and vindictive. Everyone wants to have money but hates anyone that does. I dont know if we'll ever see any of it but we have decided that if we do we'll start a charity.
I dont feel any better for putting this down. This has completely destroyed our lives. We are desperately trying to pick up the peices but its just gut punch after gut punch and then being kicked when we're down. None of this makes any sense to us and i dont think Ive done a very good job of explaining here, I know there are multiole holes in my story, but I tried to keep it as short as I could. There's a lot more to it than what Ive written and even though its quite simple, its really very complex.
Thanks for listening, and if you made it to the end, congrats. I probably wpuld have tuned out after the second paragraph.
Bless.
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