My Ex Fiancée

The bank sensing the inevitable pulled its support. The second day Mr Turnbull walked in dejected, with just his briefing solicitor. One of the bank's legal departments made a statement to the court that the bank was no longer providing legal assistance to Turnbull and it intended to bring civil proceeding against him to try and recover some of the funds.

With the heavy hitters out of the room the prosecution wrapped things up fairly quickly. When the defence got its turn it showed its desperation by producing the hard drive with vision of Mr Turnbull, Jeremy and Georgia. Their claim was that Jeremy blackmailed him into the conspiracy after he was secretly taped by Georgia. The press stampeded for the door, smart phones out ready to call the news rooms with the juicy gossip.

This dragged Georgia into the fray, she was called to appear. Jeremy had to return to the dock as well. The whole sordid saga was played out in front of the media and it was the lead story in newspapers and television current affairs for a week. Mr Turnbull's defines was on a roll until the prosecutor got Tom and Karl on the stand. They explained Mr Turnbull's enthusiasm for his old school friends firm predated the sex tape. The defines tried to discredit them as they were serving four year jail terms for drug trafficking but what thy said must have resonated with the judge. He found there was a case to answer and committed Mr Turnbull to trial.

After the circus of the committal it appeared Mr Turnbull lost his appetite to fight and changed his plea to guilty and received a two and a half year prison term.

I love to say he ended up penniless and alone but we all know that these white collar criminals are too smart for that. Just before he was charged he must have been tipped off that the securities people were sniffing around. He moved most of his assets to his wife's name then she began divorce proceedings. By the time of the trial he was supposedly living in his son's garage, a declared bankrupt with no assets. No doubt upon his release there will be reconciliation and he will be back on easy street.

The Department of Public Prosecution head must have liked the spotlight, so after the Mr Turnbull wimped out and plead guilty he went after Jeremy and Georgia. Jeremy only had a deal on the conspiracy to defraud charge but the DPP added. Use of a surveillance device to record "private acts" without consent, filming indecent acts and use of a telecommunication network to facilitate an offense. Extortion using threats and sexual harassment in the workplace. Some of these were only misdemeanours but together they added up and he ended up with three years behind bars.

Georgia ended up with a suspended sentence for recording without consent and filming indecent acts. However her face had been all over the news at various times over the course of these trials and her reputation was shot.

Some of the mud stuck to me as well, although I was only the support act to this sideshow. There was speculation as to my involvement at various times; apparently I was branded as an unstable cuckold in the financial sector. My employment prospects never improved.

So if no one will give you a job you have to make your own. I started a venture capital business, specifically for environmental projects. I'm not making a fortune but I'm surviving and hopefully doing good deeds. Penny and I stayed close but she was a player and I wasn't. I'm still on the lookout but I have trust issues which get in the way.

I have just got a project up to rejuvenate some wetlands about seven hundred kilometres west of Sydney in the true outback. Two mining companies and a bank are putting up the money to help their corporate images... I will be living in an old homestead that was once the main house for a 100,000 acre sheep station on the Darling River. I hope the clean air and the big sky country will bring a change of luck.