Good afternoon,
I would like to announce that on 24 December 2024 I attended the Brisbane City Police Station with one of Samson Rising’s legal team.
The purpose of our visit was to report the details of potential crimes reported to us by current and former members of the CFO.
We currently have 41 women who answered yes to the survey questions regarding:
‘Have you felt coerced by your husband or the CFO in relation to how you live your life including what you wear, how you spend your money, what you are allowed to do and with whom you are allowed to associate.’
(If anyone would like to know more about the coercive control laws, please email us on samsonrising24@gmail.com.)
We also have 136 surveys reporting criminal misconduct, physical abuse, or sexual abuse within the CFO.
Samson Legal has confirmed my obligation to make the Police aware of these allegations and I have complied with those obligations.
The Police wish us to reassure victims that the details of their identities are held completely confidentially by the Police and cannot be used without the individual permission of each victim.
The nature of the matters reported to Police include:
• three counts of kidnapping and deprivation of liberty,
• numerous reports of sexual abuse including abuse involving children,
• almost universal reports of psychological abuse of young adults and others alike.
• financial coercion and fraud, and
• coercive control
I am extremely grateful to the Queensland police for their professional and wholehearted reception of our reports.
I had briefed the Police the day before my meeting and directed them to the website for their reference. On the 24th I met with two Plain Clothes Police Officers from the Criminal Investigations Branch, who had already alerted other Branches of the Police Service.
During the meeting, one of the officers in attendance, was receiving emails from other Branches of the Queensland Police saying they were sorry they could not get to the meeting but assured us of the enthusiastic allocation of resources necessary to conduct investigations immediately.
These other Branches included the Vulnerable Persons Unit and the Sex Crimes Unit.
When the Samson Rising website launched on 1 December 2024, we could not have anticipated the number of reports of alleged crimes that we would receive. It was a shock, and on a personal level, many of these reports brought us to tears.
Recognising the names of people we used to fellowship with, brought it all home, and was overwhelming at times. I would like to thank the brave victims that have come forward and the Samson Rising Team for their resilience.
At the end of the meeting of 24 December, the Police asked me to delay making an announcement on Streetcar or the website, while they coordinated their response.
The Police were very concerned about the number and nature of the reports, and I cannot overemphasise how keen they are to investigate. But of course, to investigate a crime requires the actual victim to come forward.
They cannot start an investigation based on the evidence we gave them. I have included a link to the Police response I received yesterday.
https://samsonrising.com.au/police-statement/
The police are very pleased to be working with Samson Rising to broadcast messages from Police to assist anyone who is concerned about breaches of the law and to underscore their willingness to participate they said to me privately “It’s fantastic what you are doing, and we hope it brings some good results.”
My feel for it is that if the Queensland Police had a victim’s complaint in hand, they would have Police cars on Burton Lane the same day.
I can literally say, we now have a direct line to the Police. They will respond when we phone them.
Before I move onto other matters, I would like to highlight that it only took 24 days from the launch of the website to have an authority ready to investigate. The effort the Samson Rising Team has put in during this phase, is nothing short of enormous. We recognise this represents an opportunity of a lifetime to bring accountability to an organisation which has received so much criticism via our website.
For those of you who have reported crimes, it is not for us to pressure you to come forward to Police. All we can do is create this opportunity and make it as easy for you as possible. If you’d like someone from Samson Rising to help you make a report or come with you to a Police station, you only need to ask by emailing us on samsonrising24@gmail.com. This is also true for all States in Australia, not just Queensland. We can find a former member of the CFO you know and trust to help you.
Everyone at Samson Rising is a former CFO member and I can guarantee you, you will recognise us immediately if you choose to get in touch.
I spoke with two more women this week about their complaints of historical sexual assaults by a senior leader of the CFO. Both women were pleased to simply get to know me and the Samson Rising team and to be left to make up their minds whether to make a report.
Of course, not all of you have criminal matters to report. We have three other authorities with whom we plan to file reports. As mentioned in my first post on Streetcar, we are scheduling these other reports between now and 31 March 2025.
We will be seeking your participation in those reports and providing template forms to make it easy for you. These will be available for download on the Samson Rising website and Streetcar. We are working with solicitors to draft these forms and to handle the volume we anticipate.
Finally, I’d like to let you know about other progress we’ve made since the site launched.
1. We have arranged for one of the incredibly brave women who reported suffering horrible psychological abuse by the CFO, to attend a free meeting with a law firm specialising in pure psychological abuse cases.
If the firm accepts this person’s case, it will be on a no win, no fee basis, which means the door may be open to hundreds of others who feel they have been psychologically abused.
We will keep you informed of the outcome.
2. We have also confirmed that breaches of privacy can and do give rise to financial compensation to the victims in addition to financial penalties and apologies from perpetrators.
We will explain the details behind this kind of claim in another post. But my sense is that claims for breaches of privacy are going to be of significant interest to most of you. This is because the investigation is done for you at no cost, and does not involve the kind of intimidating cross examination we all fear.
In many cases a victim’s participation begins and ends with a written complaint.
3. We have commenced compiling our evidence for our reports to the ACNC and the Office of Fair Trading and we will update you as they develop.
I can tell you that the endless hours of work by the SR team, have been rewarded with the support of the Streetcar community and many others.
Indeed, we have come a long way since 1 December 2024.
On behalf of the Samson Rising team.
Samson
You can join our petition to investigate the CFO by using this link:
https://www.change.org/p/support-invest ... m=copylink