Introducing: The Outlaw Ocean
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Transcript
This is a CBC podcast.
I've seen a lot of things in my years as an investigative reporter, but nothing quite like this.
It's a video I got from one of my sources.
It shows the captain of a large commercial fishing boat ordering his crew to shoot and kill several men treading water.
AJ police have asked Interpol to help them unravel the mystery surrounding what appears to be the brutal murder of four men at sea.
My name is Ian Urbina.
I've reported on some pretty mind-blowing stories, but nothing like what happens at sea.
Water covers more than two-thirds of the planet's surface.
Over 50 million people work at sea, but the vast majority of it is a lawless frontier.
If they got within 800 meters of you, that is when we would fire warning shots.
I've spent much of the past 10 years reporting from that frontier.
Men have told me that they've been beaten with stingray tails, with chains.
His captain would put a beer can or an apple on the head of the new slave and shoot at it at sea for target practice.
Murder, slavery, gun running, human trafficking, and staggering environmental crimes, all hidden from view until now.
Every week, every second week, we used to go pick up dead people who had been either murdered or stabbed or no one knows, and we just picked them up.
A Filipino fishing boat was anchored in the South China Sea when a Chinese trawler hit it, sank it, and took off.
A 22-man crew left for debt on the high seas.
If you really want to understand crime, start where the law of the land ends.
The Outlaw Ocean, a new series created and produced by the Outlaw Ocean Project.
From CBC Podcasts and the LA Times.
Coming soon.
For more CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca/slash slash podcasts.
