Narrator/Denise Chan
Appearances
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
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Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
Yeah, it broke my heart the first time I heard it. But yeah, that's the thing. Family obligation just plays such a huge role in this story. I mean, with many of our characters, family is the reason they took the job in the first place, right? To provide for them. And then there's this additional element of... Oh, I got a great opportunity. Let me bring my brother. Let me bring my cousin.
Scam Factory
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Let me bring my friend, too. So family is both a motivator in getting the workers in and then also this network to bring in even more workers. And then you add in this family obligation part of it. So, like, you know, Jane, Charlie, Jella, they get inside and they feel ashamed that they've landed themselves in this situation. They feel so guilty.
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that they don't want to burden their family with the stress of trying to get themselves out, so they just shoulder it all themselves. I think the scam factory relies on that to keep their workers staying put, to keep them from reaching out for help because they don't want to drag their family into this even further. This is what we saw with Jella.
Scam Factory
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Even when she heard the possibility of being able to get out of there if her family paid that $4,000 ransom, she was still hesitant because she didn't want her family to have to give up their hard-earned money to these people. So... In that way, that's what makes the scam factory so insidious.
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
They're preying on these very human relationships and exploiting it to create the foundation for their workforce. So they use family to recruit. They use family to control, and they use family to extort.
Scam Factory
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I never had a chance to speak with Josh directly. So, I mean, I couldn't hear it from him. But from the time I spent talking with Charlie and Max— It's really clear that these siblings are, they care really deeply about each other. They love each other.
Scam Factory
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So I do think that when Charlie tells Josh what has happened to Max, and Josh being as close in age with Max and being so protective, he was naturally going to spring into action. And he sees that Charlie is, her hands are bound. And so Josh thinks this is the way he can help. I mean, if you look at the situation objectively, it's very natural to think, wait, how is this actually going to help?
Scam Factory
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How can Josh actually protect Max? But I think if you zoom out and look at the circumstances, Max at the point hadn't been hurt, right? So he didn't like his job. Yes, he was scamming. And he also wasn't making a grand a month, but... He was making a couple hundred bucks, which was still money. And plus he was like physically okay, just depressed by the whole situation.
Scam Factory
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So I think he really believed that if he could just suck it up for a year and his contract would end, he would be able to get out. And so... On Josh's end, when Josh sees Max in this situation, he figured, hey, he could at least keep his brother company. And then they could both make a little bit of money and ride it out together. And if anything went sideways, Josh could be by his brother's side.
Scam Factory
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But as months went on, the emotional toll of scamming people really wore both of them out.
Scam Factory
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It seems like Dev always wanted Charlie, and locking Max in was the first step in doing that. And then Josh going in just gave him even more leverage. It's a totally sinister trap.
Scam Factory
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Look, I'm like everyone else. I get all these scam texts, as I'm sure both of you do, and I just kind of wrote them off. Then I found out who was actually behind them, and my mind was totally blown. And I knew I wanted to find someone to talk to who'd been inside these compounds. So I was working with a reporter from Thailand. Her name is Vijita Duangdi.
Scam Factory
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There's recently been this sort of renewed attention on these compounds because there was a Chinese actor who was tricked into a compound in Myanmar. He thought he was going for a casting call in Bangkok and then ended up in Myanmar in one of these compounds scamming. And that actually put the compounds in Myanmar back on the map with the renewed attention. And so...
Scam Factory
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A lot of people in Asia were getting really scared and paranoid. And just to like illustrate how scared people were, there was a concert for this famous Hong Kong pop star, Eason Chan, that was supposed to happen in Bangkok. And he canceled his concert because he was scared that his concert goers might be abducted.
Scam Factory
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So, I mean, with all of that renewed attention, there's been a lot of pressure on people countries like China and Thailand to do something about it because the compounds have just kind of grown out of control in these last few years.
Scam Factory
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So it's actually been a very timely release for Scam Factory because at the end of February, it was reported that 7,000 people were freed from a number of scam compounds in Myanmar, including KK Park, which is the compound that Jell-O was at. So these people are now waiting to be sent back home.
Scam Factory
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And Colonel Matalong recently told me that there's about 180 Filipinos from KK Park that he's specifically helping to repatriate back to the Philippines.
Scam Factory
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It is exciting progress, and it shows an attempt to really crack down. But at the same time, there are so many compounds along the border of Myanmar and Thailand and still thousands who are trapped. Not to mention that there are compounds popping up every single day. So nowadays, it's not just in Southeast Asia. They're being built in the Middle East and South America and Africa.
Scam Factory
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So it all sort of feels like a game of whack-a-mole, where we'll hear news about people being rescued, but then news about compounds being built in Dubai. So in that sense, I don't know how much closer they are to totally eradicating the scam industry.
Scam Factory
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For us in the US, though, it's also been challenging to educate the public on scams so citizens don't fall for them, mainly because they just keep changing. The other day, the FTC just released a warning about those techs saying you need to pay a toll, which everyone, that's a scam unless you really do need to pay a toll. It's a scam unless it's real.
Scam Factory
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But yeah, honestly, it always feels like we're like one step behind these scammers. But it's also been a little bit alarming, you know, with the recent headlines of the new Department of Government Efficiency, DOGE, having access to millions of Americans' private information. Like, it's essentially a huge data leak.
Scam Factory
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Like, if that information got out and the scam compounds got a hold of it, it's just a bunch of people that they're going to be able to target. And they're going to be able to target and scam a lot more people. That's kind of scary and alarming.
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
Yeah. I mean, I was horrified when she told me about that. It really felt like she could never escape these people. As far as I know, she knows. I think these women are still out there recruiting. I don't know if they're still using her identity, but she has told Colonel about it. So at least law enforcement is aware.
Scam Factory
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And we'd actually heard from Colonel Matalong, who's in the series, that there were two people who had just come out of the compound literally like two or three days prior. And that was actually Max and Jane. And so when we did that interview, we noticed that Max was sitting there and While he was talking to Vajitra, he kept looking at a woman during the interview.
Scam Factory
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But from the time I spent interviewing Charlie for this series, she told me she was doing well. She had a new job and she was just trying to move on. So are Charlie and Colonel still working together? Yeah, both Charlie and Colonel have told me that they keep in touch. Charlie was still hearing from people inside the compound.
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And so whenever anyone wanted to leave, she'd connect them with Colonel. So they're still working together in that aspect.
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Yeah. So Charlie told me that Max and Josh are doing well. They finally did reunite. Her and Josh did make up and they're talking again. She also told me that Max and Josh's partners are expecting. So Charlie is going into auntie mode and she's very happy about the new additions to their family.
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I think for almost everyone, they really are trying to move on with their lives. I think in a way there's really no choice but to move on. You have to. But at the same time, I think for someone like Yuki or Jane, even when they were telling me their story, you could hear how painful it is to recount scamming someone.
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Like with Yuki, the pain in her voice when she talks about scamming that university student. It's something I'm not sure will leave them. It feels like it sticks around for a while. Even for Charlie, you know, the whole experience has really kind of traumatized her. She told me that when she was applying for new jobs, she was paranoid that she might end up scamming people.
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So I think there's also that level of paranoia, naturally, for anyone who gets out of that scam factory.
Scam Factory
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Yeah, I want to tell everyone this is happening, so don't fall for it. But no, really, you know, my hope in telling this story, to begin with, is just to have everyone realize how interconnected we all are. Like, it's a story that happens halfway across the world, but what happens over there has everything to do with us. us over here. So, you know, we should care.
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There's a direct line from the suffering there to the suffering of individuals here. We are all impacted by this very big and growing scam issue. So we all should care about this.
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Thank you, Sarah and Zachi. The pleasure is all mine. It has been such a joy chatting with you both. Thank you all for listening to the series. If you like Scam Factory, you can binge all episodes ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music.
Scam Factory
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Scam Factory
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And when we turned the recorder off, we found out that woman was Charlie, his sister, who helped him and Jane get out. And we found out that Charlie actually played a huge role in getting him there. And my jaw was on the floor when I learned, you know, how she played, not only played that role, but then she agreed to work for Dev, and then she recruited five other women, and then her
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other brother went. And I mean, the story just kept getting wilder and wilder the more we dug into it. And at the center of it all, tying it all together was Charlie.
Scam Factory
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When I heard that these scammers were actual victims, like that was very, very shocking to me. And I knew a lot of listeners would have the same reaction that I did because it totally flips the narrative of who we think these people are. I really wanted to explore this question of would you hurt people you don't know in order to save yourself or someone you love?
Scam Factory
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Everyone in the scam factory is faced with that question. But I also feel like it's a question that universally, no matter where you're from, you can understand it. And it brings up a very personal moral dilemma. What would you do in that situation? So that was really interesting for me.
Scam Factory
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I have to be honest, at one point I thought I was being scammed because some of the things that I was hearing were just so wild. It just sounds unbelievable. And sometimes they'd be so specific that I thought it felt unreal. The fact that there was a boba shop in these micro cities. I didn't believe it until I saw a menu.
Scam Factory
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You know, I heard about a luxury shop being built and selling designer bags. There are employers throwing pizza parties. Then I heard about another source who was playing with a like a baby bear, like a cub inside the compound. And it's just like you hear these things thrown at you and you're like, what? Is this for real? And then, of course, you hear things about how this company is set up.
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Like there is an HR department, an entire department that's just mining data. Then there's another department that's just like marketing, finding pictures and putting together scripts for you. And it feels fake. And it's hard to find the evidence. You know, everyone inside the compound is monitored. Their phones are monitored. Their computers are monitored.
Scam Factory
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So they really can't send photos and documents out. And even recruiters, when they're recruiting people, they are using platforms like Telegram so they can just easily wipe communications. We also really lucked out with someone like Charlie who would have photos and documents being shared from the inside. So, like, Max would send her videos, send her texts and photos.
Scam Factory
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And because she was on the outside, she could save them. So, yeah. Because of that, we were able to verify a lot of things through those images and through those documents.
Scam Factory
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No, I didn't go to any recruitment lunches, but I would have. I would have wanted to, to see how they make that pitch.
Scam Factory
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I did end up learning about some weird groups, though. Okay, so there's like this... It's a Telegram group where all the scam bosses actually are in a group chat sharing scripts and training documents with one another as to how to scam. And I had a source who somehow was inside one of these groups and so was sending me these documents, things like how to target victims on Facebook.
Scam Factory
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how to use LinkedIn to develop foreign customers, how to set up a Tinder profile. And you look at these documents and they're like training docs at a startup with like screenshots. It's like, click here, then do this, say this. And then there'd be tips like how to make conversation. How do you expand on certain topics? How do you keep the conversation going so the customer knows you're interested?
Scam Factory
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You know, you can think of it sort of like If you are a marketing professional and you're in like a professional group with a bunch of marketers and you're just like knowledge sharing, that's exactly what these groups were. Oh, my God.
Scam Factory
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You know, a lot of these, the people who fall for these scams, like they're very smart individuals. And I think that happens because they're really believable on the other end. They've got a script. They've been trained to ask the right questions, say the right things to make them seem real. And they're trained to know what emotional buttons to push and what motivates...
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whoever's on the other line, to respond or to do what they want them to do. There was one source that I spoke with who had gotten out of the compound, and he was telling me they have a scam for everyone. So if they find out you are someone who is interested in making more money and you have a lot of money, then they'll try to lure you in with an investment scheme.
Scam Factory
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If you don't have any money, they'll try to lure you in with an opportunity to make money or create a scheme to pretend to lend you money. Or if you have money but aren't interested in investments, maybe they'll create some sort of sob story to have you give them money. Like, oh, my mom is in the hospital and I need help.
Scam Factory
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And they're really good at sending texts that make them seem really authentic. You know, they'll send photos of their meals and be like, have you eaten yet? This is what I just had for lunch. Or like sending voice notes that are just like just checking in. So really, when I hear about people who fall for it, I understand because they feel like real people on the other end.
Scam Factory
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Yeah, I think that's a really good question. It's almost like the first stage of the scam is always research, which is like you find somebody and you're looking for context clues to know what kind of person they are. A lot of times they're looking for older people who might have a higher net worth. They'll look at your LinkedIn contacts. They'll look at the pictures that you post.
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Are you posting about nice places that you travel to? Are you posting about your bags? Things like that. Any signals to show how much money you might have. And then they start to chat with you. And part of the chatting process in the beginning is really just to get as much information as possible. One individual I spoke to who...
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actually fell for a LinkedIn scam, the way that the person, the scammer started talking to him was saying, hey, I went to the same school as you or I know somebody who worked at the same company as you. So like they start to build trust in that way where it's like, oh, they're probably running in the same circles as me. And so therefore, like I can trust them.
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And so like the entire time they're talking to you, it's all to fish this type of personalized information so that they can really tailor whatever scam they're going to do to hook you in that way.
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It makes you think a little bit about... How much information we just kind of casually put on the Internet. You know, it's all fun and games to put our travel or the things we like on Instagram. But all of that gives clues to who you are, what would make you respond, what your interests are. So really, my advice is to just be skeptical and try and verify things.
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If there's a stranger reaching out to you on text message, if they're sliding into your DMs on LinkedIn, they claim to know someone or they claim to be from your alma mater, try to check it out. Try and verify things before engaging in conversation. You know, sometimes people will reach out from a certain company, double-check the email address, make sure it's actually real.
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If in actual doubt, try calling the company just to double-check if it's real. And another big red flag is... If you're in a conversation with someone and they're asking you to set up some sort of crypto account, that's super fishy, no matter what context it's coming from. So just have that in the back of your mind. And the other thing I think is just to spread awareness.
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Let everybody know that these scams are happening and these are some of the tactics. I think that if more people are aware that this is a possibility that they could fall victim to, then more people will stay vigilant.
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It really was kind of a roller coaster. I mean, obviously, even from the beginning, we thought she was just Max's sister who helped to rescue her brother. And then to learn the full scope of her involvement in getting Max there in the first place, and then her other brother, Josh, then all these others as well, which is why it makes her one of the most complex sources that I've ever worked with.
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You know, it's hard because I don't know if I would have made... the same decisions that she made. So for me, it was really critical to try and figure out what that motivation was and to pin down the truth of all of it.
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That was one of the reasons why Vajitra and I flew across the world to meet her in person and to sit down and speak with her extensively for hours to really build trust on both ends. And ultimately, I think of Charlie as someone painstakingly human. I see a sister who really loves her brothers and her family and would do anything for them.
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I see a woman who was a hustler, a smart individual who thought she could potentially figure a way out on her own by maybe outsmarting Dev. I think of her as someone who has made mistakes and sacrificed others for her own gain, but has also tried really hard to make up for it. You know, like everyone in the scam factory.
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She had to make some really hard choices and she's going to have to live with the consequences of all of her choices as a result of it.
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This was a question that we grappled with a lot because it's really the first choice that sort of makes everything go haywire. You know, Charlie has said she didn't go to law enforcement because she didn't think local authorities in the Philippines could actually do anything for her brother. He was trapped in this whole other country with a completely different jurisdiction.
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And so Charlie figured she could solve the problem herself. But as we all know, that wasn't the case.
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You know... Colonel Matalong has done this for a while, and he has a pretty good sense of people. He has his own sort of tips and tricks for figuring out if someone's lying or not. And I had asked Colonel many times about what made him trust Charlie.
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It seems like ultimately there was a level of mutual trust between the two of them once Charlie started handing over information and giving a full account. In actuality, Charlie really had a lot to lose if she didn't tell the truth, right? Her brothers were in there. She could be in really deep trouble with the law. And she was at the whim of Dev.
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So I think at the point in which Charlie began trusting Colonel and telling him everything, he also did the same.
Scam Factory
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Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of Scam Factory early and ad free. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Just a note, this episode contains detailed descriptions of self-harm and references to suicide. If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, we have included resources at the end of the episode and in our show notes.
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But it was a promise Charlie had no idea how to keep. And while Yuki believed Charlie would make good on what she said, another recruit would call total bullshit. On Scam Factory, we expose the masterminds, victims, and unlikely players caught in webs of deception. But what happens when someone turns a scam into their own survival strategy? Priscilla Barbosa came to the U.S.
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from Brazil, lured by an internet friend with the promise of making a living as a rideshare driver. But when she arrived, she was completely alone, with just $117 in her pocket. Desperate to make ends meet, she started renting someone else's Uber account under the table. That was just the beginning.
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Within a year, Barbosa had built an underground empire, creating thousands of fake accounts for Uber, Lyft, Instacart, and DoorDash. She became a legend in the gig economy underworld, a modern-day Brazilian Robin Hood, scamming the system to stay afloat. But how did she do it? And how did it all come crashing down?
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The days were starting to blur together. Clock in, dick pics, clock out. And once again, it was time to clock out. Jela and her co-workers stood up from their desks, collected their personal phones, and slowly filed out of their office. As the group walked up the stairs back to their dorms, they made small talk.
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It was the best part of Jela's day. dreaming about getting out of here.
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She was the catfishing model who would sext horny strangers and get them hot and bothered enough to take it to video chat.
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Jella was exhausted. For the last week, she'd been clocking 14 hours of nonstop dick pics from strangers. She had 10 hours to rest and collect herself before it started all over again. She felt hopeless and deeply depressed. She stepped into the cramped room she shared with seven other roommates and headed to her sad little bunk bed.
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She'd hung up a small towel as a makeshift curtain of sorts to try to give herself a little bit of privacy and dignity. Jella looked down at her phone and a flash of anger came over her. It was Charlie. What the hell did she want?
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She couldn't believe what she was reading. Don't forget to tell me what concerns you have. This was rich. Jella was sitting in Myanmar, her passport confiscated, unable to leave, being forced to sextort strangers around the world. And Charlie, the woman who sent her here, the woman who had talked her across that bridge, wanted to know if she had any concerns?
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Charlie had sworn up and down that Jella wasn't going to Myanmar, that this job was legit, that this place was safe. How bold of this woman to act like she cared about Jella's concerns after lying to her face. What game was she playing here? I feel so angry. I did not respond. Jella left her on read. She did not, and would not, trust Charlie again. I was lied to.
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This woman had ruined her life knowingly. But Jella was not going to let Charlie and her recruiters win. She would find a way to get herself out. A week later, Jella finally had a day off. She pulled the little makeshift curtain on her bunk bed closed. This was the closest to alone time she was going to get. Then she pulled out her phone and texted her big sister.
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Good Lord. Not only did she hate doing this, She was also kind of bad at it.
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They had all been supportive of her when she told them about this job. She had been so happy. A job in Thailand? It was in my bucket list. After quitting her last job, Jella had started a travel vlog, posting about little day trips and hikes she did around the Philippines. She'd been surprised to see the view counts on her videos climb.
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so she thought it would be great to work abroad so she could both earn some money and explore new places for her vlog. She had a whole list of things she wanted to do in Thailand.
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A Bangkok restaurant where buff men wearing skimpy dresses body rolled off customers while they ate. And then pataya and then where there is an elephant. But there would be no elephants or macho dancing waiters. She was stuck in a claustrophobic room with seven other drained roommates, barely even allowed to leave her building.
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In the short updates she sent her family, she'd been trying to keep up the act that everything was going according to plan. Things were just really busy with her new customer service role. I just want them to think that I'm in good conditions. But as she lay in her bunk bed talking with her oldest sister, she was finding it increasingly hard to lie. Her sister was 15 years older.
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They were very close. At home, she'd always told her sister everything. And then, Jella's sister brought up their father. And then she said, At the mention of her father, tears welled up in Jella's eyes. She hadn't wanted to tell him the truth because he had high blood pressure. She was worried how he would react. But she really missed him.
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Jella could feel the lump rising in her throat. Would she even get out of this place to see her family again? She put her phone down and took a deep breath. She couldn't hold it together any longer.
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She didn't have any practice with the dirty talk or any prep in general for all the eggplants coming her way. But none of that mattered to her bosses because she had a quota to meet. She had better turn some guys on. You need to have at least two clients a day to have a video call. Two clients a day who would agree to video chat.
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Jella texted her sister about everything. She spared her the graphic details of all the dick pics, but told her about the scamming she was expected to do. how stressed she was about meeting a quota every day, how she hated lying and tricking people, and how no one could leave without paying a huge ransom of $4,000. She said that, you will live there. We will find a way.
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Jella hadn't wanted it to come down to this. If anything, she'd hoped to send money home from this new job.
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She told her sister she'd let her know the next step. And then, she went straight to her bosses and asked to leave immediately.
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They told her no. $4,000 or not, she would not be allowed to leave. They needed her.
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A feeling of dread came over Jella. If the ransom money wasn't going to get her out, what the hell could? Would she just be trapped here forever? 1,500 miles away, The woman who'd so easily lied to Sanjala to this fate was starting to face her own karma. Charlie checked her phone. It was a message from a recruit that was traveling to the compound.
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Charlie was on call to make sure everything went smoothly. And things were not going smoothly today. One immigration officer stopped her. She said that, can you just go back? I just need to ask you some questions. The recruit had just been stopped at immigration. Charlie immediately messaged the recruit, asking about what happened.
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But before the recruit could respond, notifications on Charlie's phone started snowballing. You have been removed from Thailand War 3.0. You have been removed from Thailand War 3.0. Charlie was getting kicked out of group chats. What the hell was going on? Charlie quickly texted a co-worker to ask. The woman was being detained and questioned at the airport.
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Turns out, immigration officers had been closely watching travel itineraries that came from a certain travel agency. One that seemed to always be sending people on vacations to Bangkok that no one ever came back from. And this recruit had a travel itinerary from that exact agency. Charlie's agency. Word was rapidly spreading around the company. Charlie had been compromised.
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Then she would pass them off to her team leader and they would record them masturbating on camera, unknowingly. The footage would then be used to blackmail them.
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Everyone needed to distance themselves from Charlie and her agency. This is why she was getting dropped from all the group chats.
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No one wanted a digital trail associated with Charlie's agency that could lead back to them.
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And on top of that, no one wanted to send anyone through Charlie anymore, which to Charlie seemed like it might just be a blessing in disguise.
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It felt like a massive weight had been lifted. No more bullshitting to a long list of Yuki's and Jella's. No more recruits turned recruiters breathing down her neck. No more earnest promises she didn't know how to keep. But that relief soon turned to panic because her brothers were not doing well. Being inside the scam factory was taking its toll on both Max and Josh.
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Josh, her tough, tatted up brother, who had volunteered to protect Max inside, was wracked with guilt over scamming people. Max was losing it too.
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There was so much pressure. Anytime Charlie had asked for anything for her brothers, like say the extra salary Dev had promised to pay out of his own pocket, Dev just made up an excuse.
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Dev had also quietly walked back the special treatment he offered Charlie when she first confronted him. Max found out that promise of getting out of his contract after six months was just another lie. He asked his team leader and then his team leader, no, that's not going to happen.
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In other words, Jella's job was extortion. She was working 13 14-hour days. She hadn't had a single day off since she'd arrived. She hadn't told her family where she really was or what she was being made to do. She was too ashamed. Oh my God, what is this kind of job? Besides, there wasn't anything they could do to help her. She was stuck here. And she knew exactly who she blamed for it.
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Charlie had been running around telling her brothers and herself that she had everything under control, that she'd get them out. But the truth was, her whole house of cards had already started to collapse. because that immigration flag, that was serious. Her travel agency was suspected of human trafficking. It was an offense that came with jail time. She needed to act fast.
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Now she had to try to save herself and her brothers. She had one option left, a man in Bangkok who had the keys to an escape. someone who might actually be able to save her brothers. But choosing this route had one major downside. Charlie would have to come clean about everything she had done.
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That's on the next episode of Scam Factory. Follow Scam Factory on the Wondery app, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wondery.com.
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If you have a tip about a story you think we should investigate, please write to us at wondery.com. If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline can be reached at 988. And the National Alliance on Mental Illness is available at 1-800-950-6264.
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From Wondery, this is episode three of six of Scam Factory, a story about a brother, his sister, and the big business of lies. Scam Factory is written, reported, and hosted by me, Denise Chan. Our story editor is Lou Okowski. Senior producer is Claire Chambers. Associate producer is Evangeline Baras. Reporting by Weijitra Duangdi. Additional reporting by John Vic Mateo.
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Additional production assistance from Emily Locke, Malachi Wade, and Mariah Dennis. Audio assistance by Daniel William Gonzalez. Sound design and mixing by Marcelino Villapando. Original score by Tangelene Bolton. Music supervisor is Scott Velasquez for Friesan Sync. Senior managing producer is Lata Pandya. Managing producer is Heather Beloga. Senior Development Editor is Rachel B. Doyle.
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Fact-checking by Jacqueline Colletti. Executive Producers are Julia Lowry Henderson, George Lavender, Marshall Louie, and Jen Sargent for Wondery. On Scam Factory, we uncover stories where people are deceived, manipulated, and sometimes left with life-altering scars. But what happens after the harm is done? Is justice enough? Or is there another path to healing?
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In a special limited-run series, This Is Actually Happening presents a world beyond revenge. These are five real stories of people forever changed by acts of violence, injustice, and loss. Some who were harmed, and others who caused harm. Through the process of restorative justice, they meet face-to-face with the person on the other side of their trauma. The result?
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A journey towards answers, accountability, and in some cases, even forgiveness. From victims of violent crimes to those wrongfully accused, each story reveals the power of confronting the past in ways no one ever expected. Listen to This Is Actually Happening, A World Beyond Revenge, now on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts.
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From Wondery, I'm Denise Chan, and this is Scam Factory. This is episode three, The Butcher's Block. Busy shoppers pass by the windows of a Starbucks nestled inside a mall. Charlie watched them go in and out of the guest store across the way. But Charlie hadn't driven several hours just for some people watching in an iced caramel macchiato. She was here at Dev's request.
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Dev had two recruits who had been stopped at immigration twice already. He said that, can you help them to get out? Dev needed to get these recruits through immigration. And Charlie needed to stay in Dev's good graces. In the three months Charlie had been working for him, Dev had only kept upping the ante on the assignments he gave her. Now, Charlie had her own travel agency.
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Dev had asked her to open it so he could save some money. He didn't want to use a third-party travel agency and pay their markups anymore. And she was making, well, mall calls. He asked me to meet them in person. Which is how she found herself sitting in front of a woman named Yuki and her friend. Yuki was in her early 30s and had two young children.
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A group of women were hunched over their phones in the office, giggling. The glare of the fluorescent lights buzzed while bad music blared in the background. In the weeks since Jella had arrived, having been coaxed across that bridge by Charlie and her recruiters, this had become her new norm.
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She and her friend had been looking for work abroad, where pay would be better than what they could find at home.
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Yuki couldn't pack her bags fast enough. But the first time they tried to leave the country for this job, they were stopped by immigration. They tried again, but they were stopped that time too. That's when Dev introduced Yuki to his star employee. Dev gave me Charlie's information.
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Charlie, an angel sent by Dev to help them get out of the Philippines and over to Thailand.
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The way she talks, the way she texts. Yuki was thrilled to have this person helping them. She didn't hold anything back about her recruitment.
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And Charlie doubled down on doing her job. She did some Googling and found a potential fix. If Yuki had a family member with good travel history, they could be a sponsor. Yuki's uncle agreed to help. And a couple days later, Charlie's solution worked. Yuki and her friend got through immigration.
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Ate, because to Yuki, Charlie seemed like a big sister who was looking out for her.
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But still... Charlie didn't say anything to Yuki about where she was really headed. Not when Yuki texted her about the scary journey to a strange hotel or the terrifying boat ride across the river. It wasn't until Yuki reached out in a panic after she arrived and found out what her real job was that Charlie acknowledged it at all.
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where she spent most hours of the day sitting in front of her computer, listening to her co-workers cackle.
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She stayed in touch with Yuki, checked in on her, gave her assurances that she was safe, that she'd be okay. And she offered Yuki one other thing. Two of the first people she sent to that place. her brothers.
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Charlie revealed to Yuki that her two brothers were working at the same company. By now, Yuki could probably put two and two together. Charlie had known all along that she was going to a scam factory. But Charlie's own brothers were there and seemingly okay. And if they were going to look out for her, it felt a little less scary.
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And not only did she meet Josh, she learned they were on the same team. They'd be in the same office, working the same scam.
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Charlie's brother took Yuki under his wing. He became a mentor and a friend, a protector of sorts in this strange new world. But neither Charlie nor Josh could protect Yuki from what was coming. On Yuki's third day at work, she was sitting in front of her computer. Tears streamed down her cheeks. Oh, my God. I still remember that first customer that I scammed.
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She'd been training the last couple of days. Now it was time for Yuki to start scamming. Like Max and Jane, she offered jobs reviewing hotels. Her first customer was a university student in the UK.
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The university student had picked up the job to make some extra cash. Yuki followed the script and guided her through the process. Of course, the university student made money right away. But shortly after, a negative balance appeared, which could only be cleared if the student paid it off. Yuki regurgitated what was in the script.
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But every time she paid it off, she'd be prompted to pay again. Yuki would promise over and over that it would be the last time. She even offered to lend the student money to cover some of the balance. Each time, Yuki hoped that the student would just stop adding money. But the student believed Yuki. She kept finding the money.
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And eventually, the student started using her tuition money, believing that it was just temporary, that she'd make it all back very soon, because that's what Yuki told her.
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The amount she needed to deposit had gone up again. The student was at a loss. There was no more money.
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Yuki raced outside the office to the smoking area to try and catch her breath. After a few minutes, Yuki's team leader came outside looking for her.
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The team leader didn't seem to be tormented by any of these questions. He was more concerned by the amount of money on the line. That $12,000? He would likely get a cut of somewhere around 10% of that. He ordered Yuki back inside. When she sat down at her desk, Yuki saw that he had already responded to the student.
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Jella couldn't even bring herself to say the word penis out loud. But she didn't really have a choice, because looking at customers' dicks was her job now. Obviously, not the customer service representative role she had applied for.
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Yuki's heart broke when she saw the university student's response.
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But Yuki couldn't just go home. She would wake up the next day and do this again and again and again with no end in sight. She was here now and she didn't really know who to turn to except for Charlie.
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She had trusted Charlie that it would be safe to come here. And the thing was, in spite of it all, she still kind of did trust Charlie. That she would help her.
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It was an earnest promise from someone who had fully enmeshed herself in the world of scammers. Someone who had gotten very good at the playbook. Pitch, handle objections, make promises earnestly. It was the same earnest promise Charlie had made to her brothers. To herself.
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Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of Scam Factory early and ad-free. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. A new side hustle has just landed in your lap. Like literally landed in your lap. All you had to do was respond to a random Facebook post and boom.
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They were all too busy working to talk. It was awkward, like how first days at work usually are. Max sat down at his new desk and was given some training materials. He was told to read the script. There would be a test. Max did what he was told, watching his coworkers' screens so he could follow what they were doing. But he was starting to get confused.
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The training material had nothing to do with online gambling. He looked around. No one had a slot machine or blackjack or anything that looked like gambling on their screens. And the script on his screen was all about recruiting people for a new part-time gig. They were offering people jobs to review hotels. Finally, one of his co-workers looked up from their screen.
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Max told her that his sister had toured this company before. He was supposed to be working for an online gambling company. He asked his co-worker, where's the gambling? How could this be? He then asked his co-worker, what exactly were they doing then?
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Max went up to his team leader. He told him this couldn't be right. This wasn't what he had signed up for. His team leader told him this was his job now and he should be careful because if he tried to escape this place and someone caught him... It's a shoot-to-kill order. It's a shoot-to-kill order.
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I'm Denise Chan, host of Scam Factory, and I have a brand new vintage of podcast for you, fresh off the grapevine. Blood Vines is a full-bodied podcast that uncorks the never-before-told story of the Lachardy family, one of the most powerful wine dynasties in California's history.
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Jack Lachardy was a patriarch of one of the country's biggest grape suppliers for America's most popular wine, White Zinfandel. But things turned sour when the government began to investigate the business for multimillion-dollar wine grape fraud. The case spilled over into a bloody battle for succession for the family business that almost brought down the entire industry and ended in murder.
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If you loved Succession, then Blood Vines is the series for you. Grab a glass of your favorite wine and dive into a story that has notes of fraud and betrayal capped off with a big finish, murder. Listen to Blood Vines exclusively on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.
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There's just a man on the other side of the world using stolen Instagram photos to make you believe Luna's real. A man armed with a fake profile and a script with exactly what to say to earn your trust, to butter you up so that you'll eventually give him your own money. You're being fattened like a pig before the slaughter.
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Charlie was working away in her office, which was really a room on the first floor of her family's home in the Philippines. The room had Wi-Fi and clean white walls, perfect for Charlie to snap photos of thrifted clothes and post them to her online shop. It was the middle of the night, which was normal for her.
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As she hung the wrinkled shirts on hangers and tried to smooth them out, her phone buzzed. It was Max. He messaged me that this is wrong. Max told her about the scamming.
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Don't complain, because Max was not in a safe place. Whatever they asked him to do, just do it for now. She would figure it out. But Charlie would soon find out it was even worse than she thought. Max wasn't in Thailand. He was actually in Myanmar. That little river with the little boat was a border. The men with sarongs and rifles, they were Burmese, not Thai. Fuck. Fuck.
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There's no law in that place. Myanmar was in the middle of a violent civil war. Some areas were controlled by the military. Other areas were controlled by different rebel groups. And some areas were completely lawless. No government, no law enforcement, no one to help you.
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Max stood outside the office and took another drag of his cigarette. They were only allowed a few minutes a day to get outside for some fresh air, so he savored it, even if it was hot and sticky. As he stared off into space, grateful for a break, he saw someone approaching him with a giant smile spread across her face.
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Her eyes twinkled from beneath a pair of clear-framed glasses, and her short blonde hair bounced around her face. She introduced herself as Jane and asked to bum a cigarette.
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At last, a Marlboro Blue. She grabbed a smoke and explained that she arrived at the compound a few days earlier. Like Max, she was from the Philippines, and she was promised the moon.
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But while your new job is going to cost you hundreds, maybe thousands of dollars, this man's job might just cost him his life. From Wondery, I'm Denise Chan, and this is Scam Factory. One of my first jobs right out of college was doing sales. And man, it was stressful. I had to cold call hundreds of strangers a week to pitch them something they'd never heard of before.
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Jane was told she'd be working for Amazon. Of course, Jane soon learned her recruiters did not work for Amazon. And nor did she. She'd be scamming.
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After that day, the two spent a lot of time together, since they worked for the same company. Their shift would start in the evening, which would be morning time for their customers over in the UK. They would wake up at 3 p.m., have breakfast, then head upstairs to their office. First stop, their boss's desk, where they dropped off their phones.
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Max learned very quickly that whatever he sent to Charlie, he had to delete immediately. They were constantly being monitored.
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Under the watchful eye of security cameras, the two of them sat down at their desks and pulled up their scripts. A word doc with line after line of text messages and screenshots of sample conversations. The work was pretty self-explanatory. Pick up one of their many work iPhones, start chatting, and don't go off script. It would always start off the same.
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Jane reached out with her opening line to some random person in the UK.
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If I were, say, one of Jane's targets in the UK, I'd get a message out of the blue, not from Jane, but from one of her characters.
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Shaina would introduce herself as the HR manager for a hotel company on the search for part-time remote workers. I would then naturally ask her how she got my contact information.
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Oh, a recruiting agency recommended me? Honestly, I'm flattered. Tell me more. What's the job? What's the pay?
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a couple hundred dollars for a few hours of work? That sounds sweet. Shayna would explain that all I'd have to do was rate and review hotels and earn commission for each review. Easy. I'd go through a quick one-hour training. Then Shayna would show me how to set up an account for my earnings, a crypto account that would link directly to my personal bank account.
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Then she would start assigning me hotels to review. But after working through a dozen or so reviews, racking up commissions, my earnings would suddenly drop. I would freak out because what the fuck happened to all my commissions? Why do I now see a negative number in my account?
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A bonus? And Shaina would tell me, oh no, don't worry. This is a good thing. You can make even more money by booking hotels too.
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The hotel is willing to pay a big commission if I complete the booking because it makes the online reviews more legitimate.
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Shayna tells me to just pay the negative amount displayed on the screen with my own money.
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At this point, I have doubts. I've never heard of something like this. So I'd ask Shaina, are you sure I need to put my own money in? Are you sure I'll get my money back?
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Wait, wait, wait, wait. If I don't do it, what would happen to all the money I'd already earned? I've already raided a dozen hotels.
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She's like, pay for the hotel booking, don't pay for the hotel booking. It's up to you. But hey, you'd be leaving money on the table if you quit now. Ugh, I'm conflicted. I don't want to lose the money I made raiding these hotels. That's my money. I did the work. I asked Shaina again, are you sure I'm going to make the money back?
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With Shaina's full assurance, I decide to go for it. I complete the booking. And just like Shaina said, I get that extra 10% commission. And I can transfer that money to my bank account, like, right away. And, of course, the customer will be happy. And you're going to be happy also. You're going to congratulate the customer.
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Shaina pulled through. The next day, I'd start work again, leaving those reviews while sitting on the couch. But after a few more reviews, that negative number would appear again. I'd be told I have to pay for another booking. Only this time, it was even more expensive. I'd ask Shana, wait, if I deposit this higher amount for this new booking, would that mean I'd get a higher commission?
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By this point, I trust Shana. If she says do it, I do it. And eventually, I'd see the negative number again. But now, it's so high, I can't pay it with my own money. I tell Shaina, I don't know what to do. I don't have enough money to unlock my earnings.
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Wow. Shana was offering to help me pay the deposit out of her own pocket, just so I could unlock my earnings.
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But that would never happen. Eventually, when any of Jane's customers tried to get their money out, they couldn't.
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The killing day. See, Jane was trained to build trust with her customers, to encourage them to add more and more money. It was all by design. Like pigs before the slaughter, she would fatten them up until the customer had no more money to give, until it was time for the kill. Of course, I'm not proud. I feel embarrassed to myself.
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Especially when Jane had customers who really trusted her, sometimes for months.
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A physical punishment. Like a beating. So Jane just tried her best. Seven days a week with maybe one day of rest a month.
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Max, on the other hand, scraped by, hitting just the minimum to avoid punishment. His biggest scam was about $12,000. But even as they slowly got used to it, the guilt weighed on them. Max would spend his time between shifts trying to get his mind off the job. Drink a beer or two, call his girlfriend, try to erase his day. He didn't want to do any of this.
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But to survive, he had to do what they told him. And all he could do was hope that Charlie would find a way to get him out soon.
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But Charlie was already 10 steps ahead of him. From the moment she'd heard Max was in trouble, she knew she was responsible.
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And there was the added pressure of closing the sale because part of my pay was from commission. No quota, no pay. I had to learn quick. Luckily, the formula to selling is actually quite simple. You start by casting a wide net. It's a numbers game. The goal is just to tell as many people as possible about your offer and see who bites.
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Charlie had created this mess, and she knew she had to find a way to clean it up.
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Factories were created for peak optimization, to scale the output of our labor to its maximum and beyond. We've gone from working alone, to working in small groups, to mega factories of workers laboring day and night to build or package or assemble an incredible volume of product. Amounts that just a generation or two ago would have been unthinkable.
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And in a similar way, scamming has also transformed, from a single scam artist targeting small groups to something much bigger in scale. Now there are scam factories whose output is astronomical, whose revenue rivals some of the biggest companies on the planet. And these factories are built on the backs of regular people.
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Regular people who have been armed with a script, a formula that teaches them to persuade others into terrible situations. Regular people who get pretty good at scamming because the formula works. Because human beings are, by and large, wired to give trust and to earn trust. And once they have someone's trust, they can do almost anything.
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And they will in order to survive until they can find a way out of this hell. This season on Scam Factory...
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Follow Scam Factory on the Wondery app, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wondery.com. If you have a tip about a story you think we should investigate, please write to us at wondery.com.
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From Wondery, this is episode one of six of Scam Factory, a story about a brother, his sister, and the big business of lies. Scam Factory is written, reported, and hosted by me, Denise Chan. Our story editor is Lou Okowski. Senior producer is Claire Chambers. Associate producer is Evangeline Baras. Reporting by Wijitra Duangdi. Additional reporting by John Vic Mateo.
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Additional production assistance from Emily Locke, Malachi Wade, and Mariah Dennis. Audio assistance by Daniel William Gonzalez. Sound design and mixing by Jamie Cooper. Sound supervisor is Marcelino Villapando. Original score by Tangelene Bolton. Music supervisor is Scott Velasquez for Friesan Sync. Senior Managing Producer is Lata Pandya. Managing Producer is Heather Beloga.
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After you get the right person on the phone and deliver your memorized pitch, you hit the next stage, objection handling. You'll get some variation of the question. Is this product too good to be true? What's the catch? Is it worth the money? Now here is where the very good salespeople rise above the others.
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Senior Development Editor is Rachel B. Doyle. Fact-checking by Jacqueline Colletti. Executive Producers are Julia Lowry-Henderson, George Lavender, Marshall Louie, and Jen Sargent for Wondery.
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How you address those concerns will determine whether the person on the other line will choose to trust you. If they trust you, you've already closed the sale. And that's the formula. You pitch, you handle objections, and you make promises earnestly. which is an unlike the formula to scamming. A scam artist does all those same things.
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But the difference, and it's a big one, is that those earnest promises are false. But it makes you think, if you can turn a regular person like me into a salesperson with a little bit of training and a script, couldn't you just as easily turn them into a scam artist? Most people don't want a scam, but what if they didn't have a choice? This is episode one, Shoot to Kill.
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It was a beautiful, warm Sunday, and the atmosphere was atmospheric. It was only November, but the Christmas spirit was in full force at a mall in metropolitan Manila in the Philippines. Cheerful shoppers took pictures in front of a gigantic orange Christmas tree sculpture. A woman in her late 30s with buzzed hair and sunglasses walked past the tree.
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She looked sharp. She was dressed in a men's white T-shirt tucked into gray slacks. And she was here to learn more about a job.
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Luna gets you set up in the company's WhatsApp group called Deal Smashers with a dollar sign eyes emoji and its tongue sticking out. The gig is super easy. Review a few hotels and make a couple hundred bucks.
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It's not a real name. Like almost everyone in this story, their names have been changed for reasons that will become obvious. Anyway, Charlie and her girlfriend were here with Charlie's youngest brother, Max, because he was very interested in a new job opportunity abroad.
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Max was in his late 20s now, with young kids of his own. But to Charlie, he was still her kid brother.
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Charlie knew that Max was worried about money. He was making about $250 a month giving rides to people in their family van. But after the pandemic, business had fallen off. And nowadays, the rising price of gas meant when Max did get a booking, sometimes he wouldn't even make a profit off it. So Charlie understood why Max was interested in this job in Thailand.
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He'd said it was some sort of online casino gig. And more importantly, it paid about $1,000 per month. He just wanted to have a good future for his kids. Charlie had never heard of this company. But she knew working outside of the country could be sketchy.
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And then slippers. The guy with the fanny pack and slippers sat down.
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Dev got down to business. He reiterated the basics of the job. Thailand, online casino, $1,000 a month. And he just said that everything will be for free. Accommodations and food would be provided, and that they'd be staying at a job campus that had everything they needed. Workers wouldn't even have to leave.
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As the others around the table piled pieces of pork and fish onto their plates, Charlie kept focused on Dev, asking question after question. The thing is, this is going to be about my brother. That's why I kept on asking questions. She asked Dev about visas, work permits, and how they get employees out of the country. She asked whether they were licensed and even the logistics of travel.
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After that lunch, Dev even offered Charlie a free plane ticket to go see for herself. She flew to Bangkok and traveled to the place where Max would be working. After three days checking things out, she felt reassured. She flew home and told Max the place was cool. If he wanted to take the job, it seemed safe to do so.
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A week later, Max sat in the back of an SUV on his way to his new job. He had finally landed in Bangkok. He was 1,400 miles away from home, with the South China Sea between him and his family for the next year. But his journey was only just getting started. Beside him sat a woman who was also from the Philippines, heading to the same area.
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Her picture on WhatsApp shows a pretty smiling woman who looks very approachable. She sends you photos of her dog, her meals, shares tidbits about her day, asks how you're doing.
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Max, as you'll hear, is a pretty matter-of-fact kind of guy. He doesn't elaborate much on details. Max just isn't a man of many words. And so, he sat largely in silence in the back of the SUV. The driver turned onto the highway, and Max looked out his window watching the crowded cityscape outside. Colorful billboards with Thai advertisements hung in front of buildings.
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Street vendors lined the sidewalk. Motorbikes darted between cars. An hour passed, then another. They had left the city far behind, and now all Max could see were trees and the occasional gas station and roadside vendor. They tried to ask the driver where they were going, how much longer it would take. But the driver just responded with, no English, and kept driving.
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How far was this campus exactly? The sun had set, and beside him, his travel companion looked antsy. The driver had turned off the big highway, and now they were driving up a mountain.
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The car swayed from side to side as the driver zigzagged on the windy road. The two of them held on to whatever they could grab to steady themselves. Outside, Max could see they were surrounded by trees in the middle of a forest. He looked at his phone. It had been five hours since they'd started driving. There was no cell service.
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Max's companion was getting worried, and he tried to comfort her. He told her, don't worry, I'm here.
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But even Max was getting a little anxious. At 11pm that night, seven hours after they left the airport, the driver turned down an unmarked road and slowed to a stop in front of a hotel. As the two of them got out of the car, it was eerily dark and quiet outside. A wooden sign with the name of the hotel in Thai was nestled between two trees.
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You come to like Luna, to trust her. She uses a lot of emojis. She really likes the smiling one with the blushing cheeks.
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Someone told them, go inside and rest. They'd continue in the morning. Wait, they still weren't there? Max and the woman stepped into their hotel and slept for just a couple hours. By 5 a.m. the next morning, they were back on the road. 25 to 30 minutes of off-road driving. The whole car shook as it sped along an unpaved path. When the car parked, Max and the woman were met by some local men.
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They gestured to follow them. They walked down a dirt path covered in shrubs to the edge of a muddy river. A small metal boat that could fit maybe five people waited for them at the shore. This was the way to the office? Max and his companion were told to climb in and keep quiet. Neither of them knew what was going on, but they obeyed.
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A couple minutes later, the boat made its way to the other side. The local men told them to grab their luggage and help them to climb a steep hill up from the riverbank. As soon as they got to the top of the hill, that's when they saw the men with guns. The men in military uniforms told them to get into their pickup truck.
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Another 20 minutes later, the truck drove down an unmarked road alongside a tall cement wall with barbed wire at the top. It looked like a prison. The car slowed down when it reached a gate. Men wearing sarongs with guns slung over their shoulders stood by a hut, manning the entrance. They waved the car through. Max peered out the window. Suddenly, the large patches of farmland were gone.
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Rows of tall buildings with manicured bushes and trees surrounded him. Expensive German cars were parked right on the street. It was like he'd entered a mini pop-up city. Lines of Chinese restaurants, boutique shops selling clothing, stores selling electronic gadgets, basketball courts, a hospital, grocery store, bars, even a casino. His driver dropped him off and a guide came to greet him.
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But you're definitely paying attention to the wrong things about Luna.
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The guide brought him to the store to purchase a mattress and pillow. Then they walked over to the employee canteen to get him sorted with a meal card. After the quick tour, Max's guide brought him back to a block of identical four-story buildings. The rows of boxers, T-shirts, and pants hanging off each balcony were a dead giveaway that these were the dorms.
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His guide showed Max to his room and said he'd be back to bring him to the office at 5 p.m. when his shift started. Max took a look around. He could see a balcony and four bunk beds. It looked decent. Max walked over to his bed and set his things down quietly. His new roommates were asleep, even though it was the middle of the day. Like Max, they were working the night shift. He'd meet them later.
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For now, he was glad to finally rest after the long journey here. At 5 p.m., Max walked into his new office. It was huge. Hundreds of people were sitting in rows and rows of desks, typing away on computers and smartphones. It looked like a typical call center. Max's team leader took him over to his team's section. Max counted 14 co-workers staring blankly at their screens.
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Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of Scam Factory early and ad free. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Colonel and his assistant stepped into a small laid-back restaurant. On the wall above the cashier hung the words, bringing the Philippines closer to you.
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They were so close to getting out of this. But was it already too late? So I was like, fuck, fuck. On Scam Factory, we uncover stories where people are deceived, manipulated, and sometimes left with life-altering scars. But what happens after the harm is done? Is justice enough? Or is there another path to healing?
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In a special limited-run series, This Is Actually Happening presents a world beyond revenge. These are five real stories of people forever changed by acts of violence, injustice, and loss. Some who were harmed, and others who caused harm. Through the process of restorative justice, they meet face-to-face with the person on the other side of their trauma. The result?
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She hadn't even told him the whole truth about the two brothers she wanted to rescue.
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A journey towards answers, accountability, and in some cases, even forgiveness. From victims of violent crimes to those wrongfully accused, each story reveals the power of confronting the past in ways no one ever expected. Listen to This Is Actually Happening, A World Beyond Revenge, now on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts.
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The day had started like most other days in the scam factory. Wake up at 3 p.m., have breakfast, go to work at 4.30 p.m., hand over your personal phone, grab your multiple work phones, pull up one of your fake profiles and start sending messages to unsuspecting people all over the world.
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Like always, Max and Jane had been very careful to delete any sensitive messages from their phones before getting to work, especially anything that had to do with the plans they were making with Charlie. But when Max got called to see the boss during his shift, he immediately got a sinking feeling. As he stepped into the manager's office, he could see five men waiting for him.
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The men pulled up a screenshot and shoved it in his face. The screenshot showed a group chat. It looked like it was between Max, Jane, and one other coworker. But Max didn't recognize it. He wasn't in a group chat with Jane and this coworker. The bosses pointed to the screenshot and claimed they were trying to warn a customer.
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Don't deposit anymore. It's a scam. That wasn't all. The bosses of the group chat showed them plotting an escape. Max didn't know what the fuck was going on. Had someone snitched on them? They'd heard people got paid to tell on their co-workers. Charlie had warned them. They'd been so careful. But did their bosses know what their real plans were?
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And Colonel knew all this, or enough to piece it together. He'd warn Charlie that he would investigate her if she didn't tell him the truth. But he'd stop short of forcing her to confess, because he'd also decided she was much more valuable as a source than as a suspect. The kind of information she had could not just help with rescues.
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Had someone set them up and doctored the screenshot? Max tried to tell his bosses. The messages weren't real.
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Max kept insisting the screenshot was fake. He didn't send those messages. That's when the men began to beat him.
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Every time he insisted it was fake, they hit him again. One man had a wire wrapped around his fist. Another had a bat. They were beating him relentlessly. Then the men took Max out of the office and into the work area. He spotted someone in the corner, crying.
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Jane had been confronted with the same screenshot. And when she denied any involvement, she was brutally beaten, then dragged into the work area.
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It was a message not just to Jane and Max, but to everyone. And that message was spreading quickly, from the office floor to the dorms to the cafeteria, which is how Yuki and Josh found out. They were on a short break when they spotted a big group of Filipinos huddled together.
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There was blood. They were covered in cuts. Jane's eyes were swollen from crying.
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The beating wasn't going to stop them from trying to escape. In fact, it only made them more determined. But it had also made one thing absolutely clear. There would be a heavy price to pay for leaving. And this had just been a warning.
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It could help them understand the syndicate and who was responsible. But he needed to know she was trustworthy. So he decided to play nice cop to see if he could get her to open up that way.
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Charlie looked at the photos she was getting from the group at the compound. Max had gashes on his shoulder and his neck. His arms were bruised from where he'd been hit with a wooden bat. On the back of his head, a huge bump peeked out from underneath his short hair. He was alive and resting in his dorm, but he and Jane had been hurt badly.
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It was 10 o'clock at night, but she immediately forwarded the photos to Colonel.
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They needed to be swift and clear-headed because this was a dangerous situation. The group needed to leave as soon as possible. And Colonel saw a way that this terrible turn of events could help them do just that.
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Yep. Even though Max and Jane were brutally beaten, they'd still have to go to the complaint desk and wait it out, like everyone else. The only way out of this hell was to know there was a complaint desk, find it, and lodge a complaint, even if you were still bleeding from being beaten to a pulp. Colonel walked Charlie through what the group would need to do from there. Wait, stay put.
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It could take a few minutes, or it could take a few hours. But at some point, their bosses would show up, and they would try every tactic in the book to persuade them to stay at the compound. The group needed to stand firm and insist on leaving the compound. It would be a waiting game.
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Meanwhile, Charlie would have her part to play, because this was unlike any other escape Colonel had been involved in. He was working with someone who worked for the syndicate.
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But really, they'd be negotiating Charlie's. From the moment Charlie had peppered Dev with a million questions at that recruitment luncheon, he had set his eyes on her. She was sharp. She was brazen. She was more than a little fearless. She was someone who could be very useful to him. Max and Josh were just pawns. They were low-level scammers, totally replaceable.
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But they were Charlie's brothers. And as long as they were in that compound, Dev could get Charlie to do anything he wanted. Why would he willingly let go of that? Her brother's fate was in her hands. And even after all she'd gone through, Charlie still believed she could beat Dev.
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That's on the next and final episode of Scam Factory. Follow Scam Factory on the Wondery app, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wondery.com.
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If you have a tip about a story you think we should investigate, please write to us at wondery.com. From Wondery, this is episode five of six of Scam Factory, a story about a brother, his sister, and the big business of lies. Scam Factory is written, reported, and hosted by me, Denise Chan. Our story editor is Lou Okowski. Senior producer is Claire Chambers. Associate producer is Evangeline Baras.
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So instead of interrogating her again, Colonel asked Charlie to come to lunch to talk to someone from the International Justice Mission, a nonprofit organization he worked closely with that focused on helping human trafficking victims. It was a way to show he took the situation she was in seriously.
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Reporting by Wijitra Duangdi. Additional reporting by John Vic Mateo. Additional production assistance from Emily Locke, Malachi Wade, and Mariah Dennis. Audio assistance by Daniel William Gonzalez. Sound design and mixing by Jamie Cooper. Sound supervisor is Marcelino Villapando. Original score by Tangelene Bolton. Music supervisor is Scott Velasquez for Frizon Sync.
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Senior Managing Producer is Lata Pandya. Managing Producer is Heather Beloga. Senior Development Editor is Rachel B. Doyle. Fact-checking by Jacqueline Colletti. Executive Producers are Julia Lowry-Henderson, George Lavender, Marshall Louie, and Jen Sargent for Wondery.
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Plus, Colonel hoped maybe the nonprofit would have better luck getting information out of Charlie, since they weren't the police. So that's why they were all here in this restaurant towards the end of a lunch rush. Colonel watched their conversation from a safe distance. Charlie seemed much more relaxed than she had in his office.
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The name of Charlie's travel agency had already come up several times in statements from people Colonel had helped get out of the scam compounds. But Charlie didn't take the opportunity to come clean. Colonel was going to have to do this the hard way. After the meeting, he put it to her plainly.
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The place was warm and welcoming and served really good Filipino food, which was exactly why Colonel had chosen it. Almost immediately, he spotted Charlie at a table in the corner. She was with her girlfriend and another man. They were chatting away. Colonel gave his assistant a knowing glance. His plan was working. They made their way over to a table and sat on a pair of stools.
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The evidence was damning. The authorities would have a good case, and the punishment would be severe.
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If Charlie went to jail, she might never get her brothers out. She might never see her brothers again. But if she admitted to what she'd done, if she gave up information about Dev and the syndicate, if and when it got back to them, her life could be in danger. Her whole family could be in danger. Colonel knew exactly the position he'd put Charlie in.
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He saw her value, and he saw how much she wanted to prove her value. So he turned the screws. He only had one lifeline to offer her.
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If she was going to get out of this mess, it had to start with the ugly truth. From Wondery, I'm Denise Chan, and this is Scam Factory. This is Episode 5, Negotiation with the Devil. Over the next few days, Charlie started to admit what she'd been doing for the last five months.
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With Charlie's admission, he wanted to know if she was willing to cooperate.
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He wanted specifics. He wanted any receipts or evidence that she had. At this, Charlie got nervous.
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Colonel could see she was scared. Rightfully so. She was dealing with dangerous people. But Charlie hadn't exactly shown herself to be the most trustworthy person to deal with either. After my brothers are out was not a blanket condition he could agree to. After all, it was the information she had that would allow him to offer her protection.
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Colonel could only help her if she helped him. She had to trust him.
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Charlie told Colonel how the recruitment process worked and the names of people she worked with. She shared photos from inside the compound. She offered evidence of financial transactions and details of her travel agency. She even admitted to having recruited five women herself, two of whom were now recruiters.
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She needed to be done with the syndicate, for real. Then, he wanted to know about the victims. Colonel had been stationed with the embassy in Bangkok to help Filipino nationals who had been trafficked and sent to these compounds. He knew there must be dozens of them sitting in compounds because of her.
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He wanted to be close enough to keep tabs, but far enough to give them some privacy. You need privacy for a confession. And that is exactly what Colonel was hoping for. He'd set this meeting up because he wanted Charlie to be straight with him. And because he knew that up until this point, she had not.
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Colonel wanted a list of everyone Charlie had booked tickets for. Charlie went through her records and made a spreadsheet with every single person. A list of 59 people. She indicated who never made it to the compound because they were stopped at immigration. For the 31 who did make it, she color-coded to show which compound they were sent to. Golden State, like her brothers in Yuki.
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KK Park, like Jella. Or the compound where Dev was based, Dongfeng. Among those names were the five women she had recruited, as were Yuki and Jella and Josh and Max. Colonel knew it was those last two names that really mattered to Charlie.
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Colonel wanted to help every Filipino he could. This was why he wanted that list from Charlie. He could share the names of victims who had been offloaded with Philippines immigration to keep them from getting through in the future. And he could offer assistance to the people she'd sent to the compounds who were still there. If Charlie agreed to help.
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If Charlie wanted Colonel's protection, she needed to do what he was asking.
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So Colonel told her she needed to reach out to the 31 people on her list. She needed to see if they wanted to leave and give them his number. This was her chance to let them know there was a way out, including her brothers. It was time to start organizing plans for their escape. But Colonel warned Charlie there were no guarantees.
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Her brothers and their coworkers would have to find the complaint desk and convince their bosses to return their passports. It wouldn't be easy. And it would not be without danger. Charlie didn't care how risky it was. She was already in danger. She was out of options. How much worse could things get? Inside the compound, Jane was starting to crack from the endless hours of scamming.
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Sitting in their dorm room, she confided in Max. I want to leave the place.
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It had been six long months. Jane didn't know how she would make it to the end of her contract. Max asked if she could keep a secret. He is also planning to leave. And not just planning to leave, had an actual plan to leave. With his sister. She was in Bangkok working with a colonel from the embassy, getting things ready for an escape. Jane couldn't believe what he was telling her. An escape?
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Jane asked if he could help her get out too. Max told her, don't worry. His sister was trying to get a bunch of people out. She suddenly felt something she hadn't in a long time.
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Jane volunteered to help Charlie and her brothers plan their rescue mission. Charlie was feeding Max information in pieces. They spoke in code, knowing the bosses had eyes on almost everything. They agreed that the escape should happen in a few weeks, after everyone got their next paycheck.
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That would give enough time for Max and Jane to gather the names of all the Filipinos from their compound who wanted to get out. But Charlie warned them. They needed to be very, very careful. There were rumors that workers were given a cash reward for snitching on each other, especially if they had intel that someone was trying to escape.
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The list of things Charlie had not confessed in their first meeting was long. She hadn't admitted the role her travel agency played in the entire scam operation, or explained why she had such a friendly relationship with a high-level recruiter inside the compound, or revealed how exactly she had such a huge amount of insider knowledge about how the compound operated.
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And if someone told the bosses what they were planning, that would be it. While her brothers and Jane were busy organizing on the inside, Charlie stayed put in Bangkok, working with Colonel. She had rented an apartment and she wasn't going anywhere until her mission was complete. And on this night, Charlie and her girlfriend stepped out for a bite to eat.
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They decided on a Filipino restaurant called Lola's Kitchen. It was a cozy place with bright yellow walls and bold patterned booths. And it felt like home.
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She was still a chain-smoking ball of nerves, but it was the calmest she'd felt in a long time. If everything went according to plan, in just a few short weeks, she would be helping her brothers escape.
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But she still felt her stomach drop every time she saw a message from Dev pop up. She was terrified he'd find out what she was doing, that she'd gone and ratted him out. She'd also promised Colonel she wouldn't send anyone else into the scam factory. So she was stringing Dev along, sidestepping him every time he asked if she had any new recruits.
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So far, the excuses seem to be working. So Charlie let herself relax and enjoy this moment with her girlfriend.
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As Charlie's girlfriend belted out Dancing Queen, Charlie couldn't help but daydream about what it would be like when her brothers could be at that table, eating and laughing with them. After dinner, they caught the bus back home. Charlie was still in a good mood, still daydreaming about the reunion with her brothers, feeling like she could keep up this act with Dev for just a few more weeks.
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Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of Scam Factory early and ad-free. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Jella kept her eye on the clock, counting down the minutes until 1 a.m. and the end of her shift. She couldn't wait to get to bed. Jella and her teammates began to gather their things to leave. But their team leader told them, not so fast.
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From victims of violent crimes to those wrongfully accused, each story reveals the power of confronting the past in ways no one ever expected. Listen to This Is Actually Happening, A World Beyond Revenge, now on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Jella sat at her desk. Her screen was full of open chat windows with potential customers.
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All around her sat her coworkers, with the same screens full of chat windows. It looked like a normal day at the scam office. We pretend that we are working. But behind those windows were open browser tabs. In between chats with scam victims, they were desperately scouring the internet for a way out of this hell. The risk of getting caught in a place where everything is monitored was high.
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But Jella and her co-workers felt they had nothing left to lose because they'd been out of their minds with distress since news of the impending transfer had come down. They were looking for any news about Filipinos who had escaped compounds like these.
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And that's when they saw a name that would change everything.
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Colonel Dominador Matalang. A man who had rescued Filipino nationals from compounds just like theirs. They immediately jumped to social media to find him.
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A whole list of Matalongs appeared in the search results. Jel and her group sent out messages to all of them, asking each one if they were Colonel Matalong from the Philippine embassy. Then... They found him. Jela told Colonel about her situation and that she was a part of a group of 10 Filipinos who needed to escape. Like now. Colonel told her to stay calm. He would help the group try to get out.
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But he would need her help. See, the civil war in Myanmar had made things messy. There wasn't a government that the Philippines could negotiate with. There was the military junta that had recently staged a coup and overthrown the democratically elected national government. And then there was a group from that overthrown government who were in exile and said they still had power.
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But it was a patchwork of rebel groups that actually controlled much of the country, including where the compounds were located. And since the Philippine government refused to negotiate with these rebel groups, they didn't have any formal way to step in. But Colonel Toljala, he could help her and her coworkers negotiate a release for themselves. And to do that, you look for the complaint desk.
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Oh, easy. Just go look for the complaint desk. What the fuck? Turns out scam factories have complaint desks. Yeah, for real. These Chinese companies don't actually own the land these compounds are on. They're just tenants leasing the land from groups in Myanmar.
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And because of that, some of these compounds have an office with a complaint desk, a place staffed by local administrators and backed up by a group known as the Border Guard Forces. There are people of Myanmar there. Colonel told Jella, these people are Burmese. They don't work for the people holding you. Your boss is only their tenant.
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And they don't want the aggravation or repercussions of foreign nationals getting hurt on their watch.
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The border guard forces weren't obligated to help anyone. Their loyalty was to themselves and to their own faction. But they made money from their tenants. Good money. As long as things were quiet, they didn't interfere. The complaint desks were their way to make sure that their tenants held up their side of the bargain.
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Workers could come and file a complaint if they were treated unfairly and wanted to leave. The trick was, one, you had to know there was a complaint desk.
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All Colonel could tell Jello was that the complaint desk for her compound was by a bamboo hut called a kabo. He advised Jello's group to find this kabo, go to the complaint desk, and lodge a complaint against their company. Then, they'd have to face their bosses and negotiate. And hopefully, in the end, the bosses would agree to let them out and give them back their passports.
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There were no guarantees that they'd be let out. And if their bosses found out they were trying to escape, they might try to hurt them. But Jella didn't waver. They told Colonel they would work one last shift and leave the next day. And then, shit hit the fan. Toward the end of their shift, the translator who helped the Chinese bosses deliver orders to their Filipino workers dropped a bomb.
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Not good. They had to act fast. If the translator told the boss before they found the complaint desk, it would be over for them. So they decided to leave immediately. As soon as their shift ended, Jella rushed back to the dorm. It was one in the morning and she was in full panic mode. She threw all of her most important items into a black plastic garbage bag as fast as she could.
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Jella stuffed the only cash she had in her bra and socks and typed a quick message to her sister. Colonel had told Jella that the group could have their phones confiscated by their bosses, who would in turn contact her family members to extort them for more money. Jella warned her sister not to pick up if she saw her calling after this message.
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She imagined herself being brutally beaten by a golf club, shocked with an electric baton. But she didn't share that with her sister. She sent one last text back, told her sister she was leaving now and turning off her phone.
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Jella put her phone in her trash bag and then she walked out with her roommate. It was quiet outside of her dorm. Jela and her coworkers tried to play it cool. Jela pointed to the plastic bag in her hand and told the compound guard they were just throwing out some trash. Instead of stopping in front of the trash area, Jela and her companions kept walking.
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But if you were like Jella, this was terrible news. Jella was awful at scamming, like truly awful. She'd never gotten good at the dirty talk. She'd only gotten three clients to take it to video chat. But none of them were successfully blackmailed. She'd been moved over to another group with a new assignment. Scam people into buying things from a fake Amazon store. That hadn't gone any better.
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They were leaving their dorms in small groups to draw less attention. They met up in front of the store. They still didn't know where the complaint desk was. But they decided to start walking in the direction of the entrance. The mood was tense.
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The group of 10 approached the gate. Immediately, guards stopped them.
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The guards insisted that they needed to know which compound they were from. One of the group quickly texted Colonel to ask for help. He told them it was okay to share the information, but he warned them.
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Whatever happens, don't let anyone talk you into going back to the compound. Colonel told them that they were only safe at the complaint desk in the presence of the border guard forces. Their bosses would try every trick in the book to draw them away from there. And if they left the safety of the complaint desk, their bosses could and probably would retaliate. They would be in serious danger.
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And just like Colonel had warned them, the bosses started showing up.
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The Filipinos huddled together and stood their ground. They weren't going back.
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Could they be compelled to stay at the compound with a pizza party? Uh, no. They could have all the damn pizza they wanted once they were free. Okay, well, how about a rest day?
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By the time the sun started creeping up into the sky, the group still hadn't budged.
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The group revealed that the embassy was now involved, that they'd been talking to the police attache. And then, finally, the boss relented.
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Over the next few days, Jella and her group were split up by how they'd gotten to the compound. The seven who had crossed illegally from Thailand in a boat were sent back through Massat. But Jella and two others, who had come over the bridge with valid work visas to enter Myanmar, were able to go back to Manila through Yangon.
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They were tired and had almost no money, but at least they were out of the compound. Angela wasn't done yet because now that she was out of that place, she wanted justice to make sure no one else ended up like her. As soon as she reached the authorities, she would tell them everything, including the names of the people who sent her there, including Charlie.
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So she'd been sent to yet another group. This time, someone else was doing the scamming. Jella just served as a warm body on camera for video calls. Her coworkers would tell her what to say. And using an AI filter to alter her face, Jella would deliver her lines to the target. She didn't like doing this either.
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That's on the next episode of Scam Factory. Follow Scam Factory on the Wondery app, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wondery.com.
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If you have a tip about a story you think we should investigate, please write to us at wondery.com. From Wondery, this is episode four of six of Scam Factory, a story about a brother, his sister, and the big business of lies. Scam Factory is written, reported, and hosted by me, Denise Chan. Our story editor is Lou Okowski. Senior producer is Claire Chambers.
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Associate producer is Evangeline Baras. Reporting by Weijitrad Wangdi. Additional reporting by John Vic Mateo. Additional production assistance from Emily Locke, Malachi Wade, and Mariah Dennis. Audio assistance by Daniel William Gonzalez. Sound design and mixing by Marcelino Villapando. Original score by Tangelene Bolton. Music supervisor is Scott Velasquez for Frison Sync.
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Senior Managing Producer is Lata Pandya. Managing Producer is Heather Beloga. Senior Development Editor is Rachel B. Doyle. Fact-checking by Jacqueline Coletti. Executive Producers are Julia Lowry-Henderson, George Lavender, Marshall Louie, and Jen Sargent for Wondery. I'm Denise Chan, host of Scam Factory, and I have a brand new vintage of podcast for you, fresh off the grapevine.
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Blood Vines is a full-bodied podcast that uncorks the never-before-told story of the Lachardi family, one of the most powerful wine dynasties in California's history. Jack Lachardy was a patriarch of one of the country's biggest grape suppliers for America's most popular wine, White Zinfandel.
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But things turned sour when the government began to investigate the business for multimillion-dollar wine grape fraud. The case spilled over into a bloody battle for succession for the family business that almost brought down the entire industry and ended in murder. If you loved Succession, then Blood Vines is the series for you.
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Grab a glass of your favorite wine and dive into a story that has notes of fraud and betrayal, capped off with a big finish, murder. Listen to Blood Vines exclusively on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.
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And now, she was being told that her already meager salary would be tied to her poor performance. Jella's anxiety shot through the roof. But that wasn't all. Her team leaders told them there would be harsher consequences for not meeting quota.
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Duck walking, where grown adults are forced to squat and walk across the field while everyone watched. It was humiliating. She did not want to do this. All Jella could think about was how much she fucking hated this place. How angry she was at Charlie. How desperately she wanted to get out. And then, one more update.
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A different compound? Jella was in a full-on panic now as her bosses explained that they were being transferred to another company. This new company operated out of a compound next door.
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Jella was freaking out. She'd heard rumors about this other compound.
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Jella had heard they beat their workers with electric batons and paddles to punish those that didn't meet quota. With her track record, Jella knew she was doomed.
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The one Charlie helped put her in. Before it cost her her life. From Wondery, I'm Denise Chan, and this is Scam Factory. This is episode four. This will be my last message. Charlie stood on the balcony of a studio apartment in Bangkok. She looked down at the 7-Eleven and the street vendors setting up shop below. It wasn't even 9 in the morning, and it was already almost 90 degrees.
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A humid 90 degrees. She took another drag of her cigarette.
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This was her Hail Mary last-ditch effort to get herself and her brothers out of this mess with Dev and the syndicate. And this person she was about to chat with had her smoking like a chimney. That was nervous. That was nervous. Charlie was trying to work up the courage to send a message to someone she'd heard about from a coworker. I don't know what's in her mind, really.
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On the corporate ladder of the syndicate, Charlie and this coworker sat on the same rung. This woman was the right-hand person to one of Dev's colleagues. So she said, like, out of nowhere, she just sent me a message like that. The coworker sent Charlie a message telling her about a guy from the embassy. He'd sent a list of Filipinos he knew were inside the compound.
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He was trying to get them out on behalf of the Philippine government. Charlie didn't know why this woman was telling her this information or if she could trust it, but she knew this could be crucial.
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So she took the risk and casually tried to draw out as much detail as she could, which is how she got the contact information for Colonel Dominador Matalam, police attache for the Philippine embassy in Bangkok. This colonel knew about the compounds, but how much did he know about who was in them and how they'd gotten there?
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He could already be investigating the syndicate and everyone who worked for them. And now that her travel agency had been flagged and she knew her name could be linked to those fake itineraries, Charlie needed to find Colonel before he found her.
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So here she was in a rented apartment in Bangkok, a woman who knew Dev was not to be messed with, who knew the syndicate was dangerous, who had participated in human trafficking, about to text a police colonel.
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This was never good news. Jelena and her nine coworkers made their way outside. The yard was kind of like a quad on a college campus. Except with the guards around, it gave more prison yard vibes. They lined up, five in each row. Jella stood at the front of the line. She looked around. Two-story concrete buildings all painted in a stark shade of white.
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Charlie gamed it all out. She'd send him a text message to start a conversation. She wouldn't tell him too much right away. She wanted to play it safe.
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I said, good morning po. Po, by the way, is a term of respect for someone older or with authority. He said, yes, good morning. Okay, Charlie had his attention. Now she needed to go for it.
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She told him two of her brothers were being held in Masat with many other Filipinos who all wanted to go home.
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And Colonel wanted to know what information this woman with two brothers in the scam factory was sitting on. Charlie sat in the colonel's office on the 28th floor in front of a large wooden desk, waiting. It's this small office. She fidgeted as she looked around the room. Behind the desk was an office chair with a suit jacket draped over.
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Beside the desk was a flag and a banner labeled Office of the Police Attaché Bangkok, Thailand. His assistant told her that the colonel would be right in to see her.
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In stepped a man with a serious face and short hair combed neatly to the side. But Charlie could just call him Colonel, like everyone else. Colonel was dressed in a blue button-up shirt with a tie and jeans. Even with the comfy sandals, Charlie was intimidated.
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Charlie didn't know who she could trust inside Colonel's office. I was paranoid. She'd heard that the syndicate had eyes and ears everywhere, including possibly within the embassy. And if Dev found out she was here talking to the Colonel... I'm dead.
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Charlie may have hoped she could play it cool, but Colonel could read her like an open book. Maybe it was the 26 years of experience under his belt. He took a seat across from Charlie. In his hands was the statement she just gave to his assistant, detailing what happened to her brothers.
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Colonel really wanted this woman to tell him what she knew because he'd gone through her statement. I think she is holding back. There were some things that were not adding up. In her narration, she went to Myanmar twice. She said she'd actually been to the compound. To visit. Not once, but twice. This was highly unusual. These compounds are not the type of place people go and come back from.
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Glaring fluorescent lights pouring out of the windows and doors. On the first floor was where they spent long hours, day and night, scamming. On the second was where they slept in cheap metal bunk beds. The roofs were studded with floodlights that only added to the prison feel. She looked down at the concrete beneath her feet.
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Colonel could tell that this Dev guy worked for the owners of the scam compound and wondered why Charlie seemed to have all these privileges from Dev. The answer to that question was in a last curious detail in her statement.
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Charlie mentioned the name of a travel agency that Colonel recognized, a travel agency that had booked the tickets for previous victims they'd rescued. Colonel asked Charlie about her involvement with this agency.
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For the last year, Colonel had been assisting Filipinos stuck in these compounds. But building a case against the people behind the compounds was hard. It was extremely difficult to gather evidence against these people. Victims who escaped from the compound often never even knew who their recruiters actually were.
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They almost never saw them in real life, and they almost always knew them by aliases. And most of the time, their phones would be wiped when they were at the compound, erasing all evidence about how they'd gotten there in the first place. Charlie, on the other hand, might have all of that if she was part of the operation.
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She could have plenty of identifying evidence to build an even stronger case.
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Charlie had to make a choice. She could clear her conscience or else. It was a huge risk. If she admitted to everything, she would implicate herself. She'd be telling on herself to the authorities with no promise of immunity or anything. There would be no walking back that decision or any of her actions. And Charlie needed to make that decision fast because time was running out.
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Everything she'd done was about to catch up with her. On Scam Factory, we uncover stories where people are deceived, manipulated, and sometimes left with life-altering scars. But what happens after the harm is done? Is justice enough? Or is there another path to healing? In a special limited-run series, This Is Actually Happening presents a world beyond revenge.
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These are five real stories of people forever changed by acts of violence, injustice, and loss. Some who were harmed, and others who caused harm. Through the process of restorative justice, they meet face-to-face with the person on the other side of their trauma. The result? A journey towards answers, accountability, and in some cases, even forgiveness.
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Such a sad contrast to the adventures on Thai beaches she thought she'd be having when she first met Charlie. A hush spread through the group as the boss began to speak. Beside him was a team leader and two translators. The boss started with an announcement. They were changing up the payment structure. It would now be tiered based on how much they were able to scam.