Who Trolled Amber? - Hoaxed - Episode 6: Bonnie and Clyde

Episode Date: September 4, 2023

In the final episode of Hoaxed, Alexi confronts Abraham and Ella. about what they. did in Hampstead - and why. And the police give Alexi some surprising news.Listen to the full series today. For the premium Tortoise listening experience, curated by our journalists, download the free Tortoise audio app. For early and ad-free access to all our investigative series and daily and weekly shows, subscribe to Tortoise+ on Apple Podcasts.If you’d like to further support slow journalism and help us build a different kind of newsroom, do consider donating to Tortoise at tortoisemedia.com/support-us. Your contributions allow us to investigate, campaign and explore, and to build a newsroom that is responsible and sustainable. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Here's a show that we recommend. Hi, I'm Una Chaplin, and I'm the host of a new podcast called Hollywood Exiles. Here's a show of glamour and scandal and political intrigue and a battle for the soul of a nation. Hollywood Exiles, from CBC Podcasts and the BBC World Service. Find it wherever you get your podcasts. ACAST helps creators launch, grow and monetize their podcasts everywhere. ACAST.com Just a quick note before we start. The following episode contains descriptions of domestic violence,

physical abuse of children, and some offensive and anti-Semitic language. Hello, is that Abraham Christie? Hello, is that Abraham Christie? Yeah. Hi, I'm a journalist from London and we're investigating what happened in Hampstead in 2014. In September, nine months after I first started investigating this story,

I give Abraham Christie a call. I'm sorry to call you out of the blue. I wonder, do you have a second to talk? Whom do you represent? I represent a company called Tortoise Media. I'm not sure if I can just do a cold call like this. I don't know you. You just called me out of the blue. If you think of what happened in Morocco in the summer of 2014, when Ella's children first made their horrific allegations as a crime, then there were really only two witnesses. One is the children's mother, Ella Draper, and the other is her boyfriend, Abraham.

I'd already spoken to Ella. Now it was time to speak to him. And look, I knew already that Abraham was an agent of chaos, someone who enjoys causing disruption, someone who can easily flip between the rational and the conspiratorial. So when I called him, I figured there was going to be a lot of bullshit. I just wanted to know as a kind of baseline, do you still believe what the kids said in 2014? Okay, number one, we don't use the term kids. Kids is more, it's word magic. Kids are sacrificial goats. So we say children. I'm just sharing that with you for your information. Do I believe what the children told me? Yes, I do. I do believe what the children told me. I believe that they, I know they lied. For example, they attempted to convince me that the flesh of the white children that were sacrificed and the flesh of the black children, that it tasted the same. I told you, right? A lot of bullshit. But I know that this is the first and probably the last time

that I'll get Abraham on the phone. The only time I think that anyone, any journalist, let alone any police officer, has confronted him about what happened in Hampstead eight years ago. And my challenge was to penetrate his paranoia and try to get to the truth. I really kind of want to know, I want to know why. I want to know why you did it. From Tortoise, I'm Alexi Mostras, and this is Hoaxed,

Episode 6, the final instalment, Bonnie and Clyde. Abraham Christie doesn't just believe in the Hampstead hoax. He's a full-fat, all-guns-blazing kind of conspiracy theorist. To him, every public figure is corrupt, every institution infiltrated. When I say a pedo-sodomite death cult, the Boy Scouts, the Boy Scouts is a pedo-osodomite death cult, the Boy Scouts, the Boy Scouts is a paedosodomite death cult. The Roman Catholic Church, the military, the police force, the educational system is run on the same lines. His central argument is you'd see the truth too if only you opened your eyes. The Royal Courts of Justice, they're run by Masons, Freemasons and Talmudic Jews.

Listening to Abraham feels like putting my head in a beehive, a constant aggressive noise. But actually, what he's saying, it has a lineage, a context. And to understand it, I need to take a step back. You see, traditional conspiracy theories, like the Salem witch trials or the hysteria in the 1990s known as the Satanic Panic, tended to target people without much power.

Poor women accused of being witches, nursery teachers slandered as Satanists. Whereas Abraham's ranting represents something different. He doesn't just pick on marginalised members of society. He thinks the whole damn system is corrupt. I'll tell you who else is involved. Tony Blair is involved in the fraud. Who else is involved? Prince Andrew. He involved in the Hamstpered cover-up because his fraud... Abraham's belief in an all-encompassing conspiracy is actually quite a modern phenomenon,

something that really emerged in the second decade of the new millennium. These new conspiracies take classic tropes like anti-Semitism and satanic ritual abuse and they splice them together with more modern fears about a powerful elite controlling all of our lives. To Abraham, Satanism is only part of the story. Because it's all connected. Yeah, they're all connected. So it's Freemasons.

You see, the satanic aspect, as it were, is merely one facet. One facet of the overall cult situation. This all reminds me a bit of that evil dinosaur in Jurassic World. The one which was genetically modified to include the most lethal bits of other, less powerful dinosaurs. the most lethal bits of other, less powerful dinosaurs. And the beating heart of these new genetically modified conspiracies is the idea that organised child abuse exists at the highest levels. We know from the QAnon phenomenon that the notion of the ritual abuse and slaughter of children

has somehow become a major part of the conspiracist mindset. It's a very peculiar thing, and I wouldn't have predicted it ten years ago. In fact, I would have bet against it. To gain some insight into Abraham's ramblings, I paid a visit to the Hampstead home of David Aronovich, a broadcaster and a columnist who wrote a book called Voodoo Histories.

I've always been interested in why people believe the strange things that they do, not least because I came from a household full of communists who, amongst other things, kind of believed the Russian version of events at one stage in their lives. The notion that the animating elite, the conspiratorially, are so wicked that not only do they want to control the world, but they actually want to do the worst thing you can possibly imagine. And the worst thing that modern society can possibly imagine is massive and violent and sexual abuse of children. So the whole kind of thing mixes child abuse,

horrible child abuse, with the idea of the conspiracy. So by 2014, when Hampstead emerged, there was this new wave of master conspiracy theories, combining multiple smaller conspiracies with child abuse right at the core. And in the UK, believers were given an almighty boost by a single figure who seemed to vindicate everything they were saying. A name that Abraham and every other conspiracy theorist I spoke to kept bringing up. Jimmy Savile and Ricky were both coal miners in Rotherham. Jimmy Savile.

Former children's entertainer with powerful friends in the British establishment, who was exposed as a paedophile after his death. And since the exposure of Jimmy Savile, more and more interest has been revived in this subject of SRA and of cover-ups. And I don't know whether Greece has been reached by this story of this terrible Jimmy Savile, who is not alive anymore, but he has made at least the story of this terrible Jimmy Savile, who is not alive anymore, but he has made at least the topic of child sexual abuse topical. That and how he was even part of a satanic ring. This isn't the first time we've heard about Hampstead

as it pertains to pedophiles and satanic rituals. The name Jimmy Savile comes up. Jimmy Savile. In late 2012, the news broke that Jimmy Savile, a DJ and television presenter knighted by the Queen and famous across Britain, had abused dozens, if not hundreds, of children. Savile had died the previous year, before any of this came out, so he never had to face accusations that he was a serial sex predator. What was even worse was that people in positions of power had covered up Saville's

abuse and had ignored his victims. To anyone already minded to believe in conspiracy theories, in cover-ups, in nightmares, Saville was the proof they needed. Jimmy Saville was a victory. That was a victory for anyone who doesn't believe in hype conspiracies. The Saville case became a lodestar for members of Conspiracy Inc, for people like John Wedger, the former police officer who is a major spreader of the Hampstead hoax. I think there is no way they can ever, ever hide behind the fact, oh, it's just a conspiracy.

No, this man's back. You've got him. With him, you've not only got child abuse, you've got all his friends in high up places, got necrophilia, and you've got devil worship. You've got it in one bundle. Saville had everything. Child abuse, elite cover-ups, Satanism. And the case happened just as social media usage was beginning to rocket. By 2014, when Hampstead happened, 1.5 billion people used Facebook. And at that point, the platforms were doing very little to prevent illegal content from being shared.

So by the time Abraham Christie met Ella Draper, the embers of a conspiracy were smoldering just beneath the surface, waiting for someone to stoke the fire again. When we talk, I feel like Abraham doesn't want to discuss Hampstead, that he wants to control our conversation. He likes talking about his pet subjects, like the health qualities of cannabis. And he tries to unsettle me by asking if I'm gay. Are you homosexual, Alexis? Have you slept with a man before, Alexis? Or by making a dig at the fact that I'm half Greek.

The Greeks are known for sodomy. They call doing it Greek style, anal sex. But I know that I need to press him on some of the questions I've been desperate to ask. I've got a list and I'm crossing them off as I go. I just wanted to know, ultimately, if the judge was right and you did make the kids lie by physically and psychologically abusing them, I really kind of want to know why. I want to know why you did it. For you even to give that even a smidgen of credence, I can't trust you. You're clearly

laboring. You clearly haven't got a clue, Alexis. I'm just going on what a trained judge and... You haven't got a clue, young man. You haven't got a clue. I'm just going on what a trained judge and... You haven't got a clue, young man. You haven't got a clue. I'm sorry. I ask him if he was in the UK recently. It's a question that really seems to piss him off. We were told that a month ago or a few weeks ago you'd left Marrakesh to come to the UK. Is that true?

Who told you that? Who told you that? We were told by a couple of people, actually. I'm asking you a question. You like to ask questions, but you don't like to answer. Is that incorrect? Did you not come to the UK recently? Did I not come to the UK? Well, they said I was in the UK, did they?

It sounds like you might have been in the UK, based on your answers. It sounds like I might have been. See, you're a disingenuous little bugger you are. You don't believe anything I say to you. Then I ask him if he's been violent to children. In your relationship with Ella's children, you said that you gave them licks, I think is the word that you used. Yes, I gave them licks. Yes, I gave them licks.

Yes, I gave them licks. What are licks? I gave them licks. Yes, I gave them licks. What are licks? The licks. I gave them licks with a spoon. Did you beat up your son, I think he's called ******, in 2014? No, I didn't beat up my son in 2014. I grabbed him and chucked him out the house because he was in a gang and he was being a bit bolshie. I confront him about the allegations of abuse made by his

former family. One of the things that kind of troubled me recently was, I mean it was kind of public because it was on your Instagram, was that your stepchildren made pretty serious allegations against you in terms of they said that you had abused them physically and psychologically and it sounded quite similar to what the judge said had happened in the Hampstead case. Well, of course it did, because they have to copy it. Now, if you've read, if you've seen the videos that I've put up, if you've seen them and you've honestly analysed it, then you know what the score is.

And after all of that, it's clear that Abraham is not sorry. Not sorry for any of it. It's not just Ricky who you and Ella kind of affected quite badly. It's a lot of other parents of the school whose lives were really kind of impacted. And I just wondered whether you had anything to say to them. I would tell them to stop abusing children. I would tell them to show the tattoos. I would tell them that their cult has been exposed

and that sodomising children does not extend their lives. Abraham won't tell me why he made the kids lie in the summer of 2014. He won't admit that any part of the story is fake. But from his answers and from what I found out about him, I can make an educated guess. A potent combination of money and love. I'm in the top 10 of hemp seed nutritionists in the world. I was the first one to supply hemp seeds on the shelves of the health food stores in London in 1996. The reason the children spoke, the reason the children, one of the reasons why the case is so rare, is that the

children spoke because we have an endocannabinoid system. I mean, this is cutting-edge science. Remember how Abraham fed Ella's children hemp smoothies? Well, his claim has always been that they were brainwashed by their abusers. That they suffered from something called trauma-based mind control, a well-established conspiracy theory which accuses powerful people of manipulating the minds of their victims. And guess what Abraham thinks is the only thing capable of releasing a child from this sort of abuse? His own cannabis smoothies. Via the nutrition, the nutrition helped them

to overcome the trauma-based mind control programming that they had been subjected to. In June 2014, a month before he went to Morocco with Ella's children, Abraham set up a company called Hempstar Dynamics, selling hemp juice. Ella was a director too. On one of the home videos made by Ella and Abraham of the children just a few weeks later, Ella's young son turns and says into the camera,

when I eat hemp, I feel strong and powerful. In the conspiracy community, lots of people believe that cannabis and hemp can reverse trauma-based mind control. that cannabis and hemp can reverse trauma-based mind control. So Abraham had an economic interest in promoting the idea that his hemp smoothies freed the kids from abuse. But I don't think that Abraham would have created this vast paedophile conspiracy just to make money. There must have been another, bigger reason why Abraham

did what he did. And I think it's the most significant reason of all. Love. Does Ella ever come and visit you in Marrakesh? Does Ella ever come and visit me? I've seen her. I love her. I've never met a woman like her, and I would never meet a woman like her. Abraham hates pretty much everyone. He's turned on Sabine McNeil and Belinda McKenzie, accusing them of being spies for MI5. He's fallen out with John Wedger, the former police officer, and other supporters of the Hampstead hoax.

He certainly does not like me. You're a cover-up merchant. That's what you are, Alexis. You are attempting to do a cover-up. But the one person that he's never said a bad word about in eight years is Ella. She's an amazing woman and I love her. OK, so if you want to ask... See, I don't care, I'm telling you. No-one knows this, but I'll tell you, I don't care.

OK, Alexis! OK, Ella's a great woman, a fantastic mother. She's fantastic, a great partner, a wonderful woman. In 2014, this wonderful woman was in trouble. Well, what happened is that Ella kept... I could see what had happened to Ella, that she'd been in court for years and she was getting nowhere. They were just slowly, incrementally, sort of like wearing her down

and attempting to steal her children from her. Ella was trying to get sole custody of her kids, trying to take them home to Russia. And what Abraham seems to be telling me is that he thought he could help. I'd advised Ella that she was only going to get pressure, that she would receive no joy going to the courts, you know, that they're rigged, it's a rigged court,

so you've got no chance. And I started to tell her about, explain about the Freemasons and the rest, but she'd been going to court for four years, she'd been, she'd accustomed to it. But she eventually listened to what I said and she realised, of course, she was going to get no justice. The courts are run, the court, what is it, the Royal Courts of Justice, they're run by Masons, Freemasons and Talmudic Jews. Now, these cults, they are all pedo-sodomite death cults.

You know, if you're foolish enough to believe that the children aren't telling the truth, then you're either a cult member or you're a crooked reporter, one of the two. Eventually, Abraham's patience with me runs out. And the feeling is mutual. OK, well, listen, I really appreciate it. You have a good night now. Good night? As in, you have a good evening.

Good night. Come on, Alexis. Gali nicta. Gali nict in, you have a good evening. Good night. Come on, Alexis. Kali nikta. Kali nikta. Kali nikta. Kali nikta, Abraham. Bye-bye. Kali nikta.

Bye-bye. Talking to Abraham was like glimpsing the answers I was seeking through a pane of coloured glass. I could make out their shape, but I couldn't see the detail. I could tell that he still loves Ella, even though he's not living with her anymore, maybe hasn't for years. That he still has feelings for her, that given the chance he'd do anything for her. But that didn't explain why Ella did what she did, why she let such a violent man so close to her children. Okay, well of course I'm expecting this question to come at any interview, to be honest, because this is like one of the most controversial points in the story.

I've thought quite a lot about how to interpret Ella's interview with me. My conversation with Abraham had shown me how dominating he could be, a dangerous mix of charm and threat. And this guy came into Ella's life like a whirlwind, changing everything in the space of a few months, moving into her flat, behaving aggressively towards her children, changing their diets. And I also know that Ella's previous relationship with Ricky

had been seriously toxic, that there had been allegations of abuse on both sides. All of which means that I was open to see Ella, at least partially, as a victim. Someone who found herself in a desperate situation and was willing to take desperate measures to get out of it. Someone who saw Abraham as a way out and didn't have the ability or the opportunity to see him clearly. Maybe he was controlling her.

Maybe he still is. But it's still really hard to hear her defend Abraham, to play down his abuse. defend Abraham, to play down his abuse. Abraham is not a child abuser. He's not handling himself very well. And he's prone to violence. On the other hand, you know, he means well, in a way, you know, he means well. And in regards to handling children, I think he's done his best. We've all done our best, but we do our best in certain ways. But of course, to be honest, to be truthful with you, I still have a difficult time forgiving Abraham for this behavior. But again, do I have the right to judge? There was one point in Morocco where Abraham seems to have hit Ella's son in the face. And this is how she relays it to me as basically an accident.

There was one incident when he was in the room with my son and they were talking and they had an argument. And that's what Abraham told me. Now, he said that he's kind of like done this kind of thing, but he didn't hit him his head and he's caught his head basically i think like the top of his head or like around his eye something like that so next thing i started to have a swollen eye the more i look into this story the more I re-examine my interview tapes with Ella and dig back through the court documents, the more this idea of Ella as a passive victim, a character controlled by her partners, disintegrates. There was something in the judgment, the Pofli judgment, that I just wanted to ask you about. She said both children were presenting as and complaining of being hungry at school. This is sort of between 2010 and 2014. Was something going on there that made them be hungry

or what was happening around then? The NCPCC, right, the Child Protection Organization, they received an anonymous phone call from unknown party saying that the children been abused by their mother, that I'm not feeding them, I'm holding them outside naked, that the children are going through the rubbish bins and things like that and that the children are going through the rubbish bins and things like that. And a number of other things, just total rubbish. You're invited to an immersive listening party led by Rishi Keshe Herway,

the visionary behind the groundbreaking Song Exploder podcast and Netflix series. This unmissable evening features Herway and Toronto Symphony Orchestra music director Gustavo Jimeno in conversation. Together, they dissect the mesmerizing layers of Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring, followed by a complete soul-stirring rendition of the famously unnerving piece, Symphony Exploder. April 5th at Roy Thompson Hall. For tickets, visit tso.ca. ACAST powers the world's best podcasts. Here's a show that we recommend. Hi, I'm Una Chaplin, and I'm the host of a new podcast called Hollywood Exiles.

It tells the story of how my grandfather, Charlie Chaplin, and many others were caught up in a campaign to root out communism in Hollywood. It's a story of glamour and scandal and political intrigue and a battle for the soul of the nation. Hollywood Exiles from CBC Podcasts and the BBC World Service. Find it wherever you get your podcasts. ACAST helps creators launch, grow, and monetize their podcasts everywhere. ACAST.com In October 2013,

six months before Abraham came on the scene, someone reported Ella to the NSPCC, Britain's main child protection charity. They claimed that Ella's children had been left out on the balcony, cold and hungry. This set off a chain of events. Social workers went round to Ella's house, checking her fridge to see if it was properly stocked. They also went to the school, where the teachers relayed their own concerns. That final meeting, I think in January, happened in the headmistress' office. And there she was saying that, you know, she heard that the children were underfed and going through the rubbish bin.

I confronted her. I said, where have you got this information? She said, I've heard it somewhere. Then she backed off. She said, oh, no, no, don't worry about it. It just must be like a rumour or something. But she was trying. She was trying to incriminate me, even at that point, the headmistress. According to legal documents I've seen, the school had raised concerns about the children twice in 2013, long before Abraham came on the scene.

And suddenly, all the pieces were beginning to fall into place. I went back to look at Ella's list, the list of 175 names of supposed Satanists. There was the name of the headmistress, the woman who had undermined Ella in front of the social workers. There was the name of the social worker who had recommended that Ricky should be allowed to see the children. There was the name of the person who Ella suspected had called the NSPCC. Even Sam, the Hampstead mum who had annoyed Ella by feeding her children non-vegan food, was there. I genuinely thought that I had been put on the list

because of that fateful party. Because of the vegan food thing? Because of the vegan food thing? Because of the vegan food thing. And then, suddenly, I remember something that Abraham said to me in our bizarre conversation. I didn't know any of the teachers. I didn't know their names. I didn't know any of these characters. But the children told me all about these characters. So if I had told, if I'd beat them and made them tell the story, how could I have made them say it if I didn't know any of these characters?

I've only known the children for three months, remember that. Abraham was right. He couldn't have known more than a handful of people on the list. Ella's first husband, the finance guy who brought her to England, is on the list, accused of being the financial supporter and active member of the cult. Ella split up with him around a decade before Abraham arrived. Putting him on the list doesn't feel impulsive to me. It feels vindictive and calculating. Re revenge served cold.

So it's a grey, overcast, early autumn day, and I've come to Rode in Hampstead, which is where Ella Draper and Abraham Christie lived in 2014. It's where the hoax basically happened. It's actually quite a modest road for Hampstead, by Hampstead standards, but still some really nice houses, BMWs and Mercedes in the drive. This month, I went round to visit Ella's old neighbours in Hampstead to see if they remembered anything from the time. It's sort of eight years ago so I don't expect people to remember much but we're going to give it a go.

So I'm just going to go up to the first neighbour's house. OK, let's try here. I've lived in this house since 1978, so I've seen people come and go. This end of the road is very friendly and we all know each other and people have been very helpful to me since I had my operation and so on. This is Suzanne. She lived next door to Ella in 2013 and 2014. She's a linguist and she also used to be a professional singer.

I had a job in publishing to do with editing a directory of companies in Europe where I could get days off when I had a concert. Wow. What kind of singing did you do? Classical music. Not much opera because I was a contralto, but recitals and other things. And I did that till I was about 60. And then I stopped. And if you want to know, I'm 86 now.

I wasn't going to ask. No, I'll tell you. Suzanne remembers Ella, which isn't surprising because she was also one of the people who ended up on Ella's list. Luckily, Suzanne doesn't use the internet, so she was shielded from the worst of it. She was spreading rumours that neighbours like me were abusing the children too.

She said I touched the children inappropriately. But what they were doing were beating the children to say this kind of thing. Her boyfriend was caught wandering around on the roof with no clothes on. I think he dominated her. You think he dominated her? I think so, yes. Whether or not Abraham was dominating Ella,

it's clear to me that after he came on the scene, she seems to have prioritised him over her children. Do you remember Abraham's stepdaughter, the woman who accused Abraham of abusing her and her siblings years before he got together with Ella? Well, this stepdaughter wrote an email directly to Ella in September 2014, warning her about Abraham. She calls him Aby. Hello Ella. My name is ****. I'm Aby's so-called daughter. I'm not trying to cause trouble,

but I believe you should know the truth about Abraham Christie. know the truth about Abraham Christie. I've cross-checked the dates and Ella would have received this email right at the start of the police investigation, when the children were telling officers that there was a satanic cult. The email is a page long. It's a detailed list of accusations against Abraham, accusing him of pretty horrific violence. I don't know how Ella reacted when she received that, but I do know that she never replied to the stepdaughter, and that she didn't tell the police or remove the children from Abraham's orbit. This sense that Ella stands by Abraham through everything is reinforced by the police interviews with the children

when they tell officers that Ella was there when Abraham kicked them. OK, and why do you think she let him do it? Did she try and stop it, or...? No, she never done that. Never. Why? Not ever. She'll never do that. Why not? She loves him so much. When I get back from speaking to Ella's neighbours, I do some more research.

I run a search for websites registered to Ella's address in Hampstead. There's a couple of yoga ones, but also I find sites with names like Hampstead911.com, Hampsteadcoverup.net and puppakillsbabies.org, dating all the way back to 2015. And it's Ella's name, not Abraham's, on the registration documents. And when I was speaking to her, I did notice moments when her mask slipped, when she seemed almost as much of a conspiracy theorist as Abraham. Our first conversation happened on the day Russia invaded Ukraine,

in February 2022. Ella told me who she thought was to blame. isn't it? Like a cabal. Exactly, exactly. And they've been supplying, there's been supplying nationalists with a weapon, which they've been using against peaceful people, you know. We're talking about, actually,

children and women. It's all parts of the same plan, isn't it? To kill the economy of the world, to destabilize the world, really, and to eventually enslave everybody, isn't it? Like Bonnie and Clyde, Ella and Abraham seem to exist as two parts of the same entity. I don't think you can define one without the other.

They seem to have been swept up in each other's extremism, the sort of couple who generally don't give a shit about anything or anyone else. A few days before this podcast comes out, I tried to call Ella one more time. We're going to give Ella Draper a call on your phone because she'll probably recognize my number. Yeah, should we go for it? Okay. Hello? Hello, is that Ella? Yes. Hi Ella, it's Alexi Mostris from Tortoise. Hi, Alexi. Hi. Hi. Hi.

I just wanted to call you because I wanted to tell you that the podcast has come out and to see if I could just ask you a couple more questions because we didn't get the chance last time. Alexi, how dare you? You're saying that I'm lying on the podcast and now you're coming back to me to make me look even worse or what? I just wanted to get your answers to a couple of questions that I had. Ella, I think people would really like to know

why you helped Abraham make your children lie about the hoax. Oh, she's gone. Well, I guess that's it. After months of thinking about this, I think I'm close to understanding why Ella and Abraham did what they did. Ella saw Abraham as a gun she could use to fire bullets at anyone who'd ever slighted her. But what I still don't understand is why no police action was taken against either of them. Because looking at the documents filed for Ella's family court case, it's clear that the police knew about Abraham's history of violence at an early stage. They knew that he'd been charged with assaulting his teenage son

earlier that year. They knew that he'd been violent towards his ex-wife. They even knew he'd been hitting Ella's children with spoons. And yet, they didn't even bother to interview him. They had an opportunity to arrest me. They had ample opportunity to arrest me. There's nothing to arrest me for. They didn't even take a statement from me because they know that all they would get from me is the truth. So they weren't interested in anything I had to say. This summer, when I was talking to the police about this case, it seemed like they still weren't interested. They sent me a bland statement. This is an old case, they said. We're not going to be able to help.

But after I returned from Marrakesh to London, I think I set something in motion. I speak to a source, someone I've been talking to a lot during this investigation, someone who helped convict one of the main hoaxers and has a huge amount of information about the case. And I tell her what I've discovered in Morocco, that Abraham might be here in London.

And she tells a contract of hers in the police. And that, I think, is the genesis of something I totally do not expect. Because a few weeks later, the Met Police sends me a new statement. Following new information coming to light in August 2022, officers have reopened an investigation into child abuse, which was reported to have taken place in Hampstead in 2014. According to my source, what happened was that after learning that Abraham might be in the UK,

the police contacted Ella's children to ask if they would cooperate with an investigation. And the kids, who are teenagers now, said yes. After so many months spent thinking that this was a cold case, something that the police were happy to forget about and move on, this news hits me quite hard. It's a significant development after eight years of stasis. The investigation into Abraham Christie, and maybe Ella too, has been reopened. I don't actually know what the police think they can do to bring the pair to justice. Maybe Abraham's already back in Marrakesh, in which case that's a problem as the UK doesn't

have an extradition treaty with Morocco. But the police must think they can do something, otherwise they wouldn't bother putting resources into a new investigation. Otherwise they wouldn't bother putting resources into a new investigation. So although I don't know what will happen now, I know something is happening. And I don't have that nagging feeling anymore that Abraham has just got away with it. Instagram has also taken down Abraham's account after I sent them evidence of what he'd been posting, evil messages accusing Ricky of being a paedophile, videos showing the children's faces. So that just leaves Ella. She's quite isolated now. I think I've tracked her down to a place called San Roque in Cadiz,

a region in southern Spain. She's still pushing out her lies, still working with conspiracy theorists, still asking for funds to mount a legal appeal against the Hampstead cover-up. And she still has some followers left. Now, this is for the attention of Alexi Monsters, the English barrister, Like this Australian guy called Arthur, who, it's fair to say, does not like the way I've portrayed Ella in this podcast. I have listened to your first four episodes of Hoaxed, and to say I'm fucking disgusted and rumble is an understatement.

And you only have to read some of our reviews of our podcast, calling me a paedophile protector, and worse, to know that for some people, this story will always be true. But fewer and fewer people seem to be listening to Ella herself. Her power seems to be fading away. A few days before we published this episode, I phoned Karen, the novelist from Canada who mounted the fight back against the hoaxers. Karen spent time with Ella's children fairly recently. They're now teenagers, living under different names. The daughter is turning 18 next year,

and I want to know how they're doing. They seem to me like incredibly well-adjusted considering what they had been through. They were very, very attached to their dad. They were very bright and curious and interesting kids to talk to. And what struck me about them most was exactly how normal they were and how anyone who didn't know what had happened to them might not be able to tell from the outside. And they seemed to be just happy, normal kids. Eight years ago, these two children were at the centre of a very private trauma

which was transformed into a very public conspiracy theory. And in all those lies about Satanism, their real abuse was overlooked, abuse at the hands of Abraham and their own mother. But the children have adapted. They've gotten on with their lives. They're doing okay. And now, finally, they may be able to see justice for all they had to endure. And ultimately, in this crazy story, that's what matters. Hoaxed was brought to you by me, Alexi Mostras, Gemma Newby, Immy Harper and Xavier Greenwood.

Sound design was by Eloise Whitmore. The executive producer is Basha Cummings. And a special thanks to Karen Irving for all her help in reporting this series. Thanks for listening. To hear about all of our investigative series, follow Tortoise Investigates wherever you get your podcasts. For the best Tortoise listening experience, curated by our journalists and with additional episodes and content,

download the Tortoise audio app. Or if you just want early and ad-free access to our podcasts, you can subscribe to Tortoise Plus on Apple Podcasts.