The 1MDB scandal – Clare Rewcastle Brown and the world’s biggest financial heist, Part One

The 1MDB scandal – Clare Rewcastle Brown and the world’s biggest financial heist, Part One

From True Criminals by Audio Bleach Global

September 7, 2026 · 52 min

About this episode

This episode features Clare Rewcastle Brown discussing her investigation into the 1MDB scandal and the corruption surrounding it.

In this first of two special episodes of True Criminals, journalists Helen Fospero and Martin Brunt are joined by investigative journalist Clare Rewcastle Brown, whose reporting helped expose the extraordinary corruption at the heart of Malaysia’s 1MDB scandal. Rewcastle Brown’s investigation began in Sarawak, Malaysian Borneo, where the destruction of tropical rainforest and the loss of indigenous land led her to investigate political corruption. Following the money would eventually take her to 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB), the Malaysian state investment fund established under former prime minister Najib Razak. US prosecutors later alleged that more than $4.5bn was misappropriated from 1MDB, with money funnelled through shell companies and offshore accounts and spent on luxury property, jewellery, priceless art, a superyacht and assets connected to the financing of The Wolf of Wall Street. Rewcastle Brown reveals how leaked documents and whistleblower Xavier Justo helped her uncover a money trail involving PetroSaudi International and Malaysian financier Jho Low, the fugitive businessman alleged by…

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