Secrets of the Underworld

Freelance journalist Nicole had no idea that a chance encounter at a kids' footy catch-up would upend her life for the next three years. A brief, strange interaction with a woman at the sidelines seemed harmless enough — until the messages started. What began with a vulgar Facebook message quickly escalated into relentless contact across every platform Nicole used.
In this episode, Neil speaks with Nicole — journalist and author of Obsession — about the three years she spent being stalked by the ex-partner of a man she'd fallen in love with, the repeated failures of police to take her seriously and what it finally took to get the law on her side.
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Marissa Rose has spent 14 years as a paramedic — chased out of houses, holding arterial bleeds with her bare hands and sent alone to crashes in the middle of nowhere on her first day on the job. But long before the ambulance, she was a little girl making tea at four years old, hands shaking, never knowing if it would be good enough.
In Part 2, the conversation goes to the darkest places: the hangings that stay with you, the jobs you can't leave at work, the night Marissa had a date set, a plan made and a wedding anniversary picked. What pulled her back wasn't a hotline or a hospital. It was horses.
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Marissa Rose has spent 14 years as a paramedic — chased out of houses, holding arterial bleeds with her bare hands and sent alone to crashes in the middle of nowhere on her first day on the job. But long before the ambulance, she was a little girl making tea at four years old, hands shaking, never knowing if it would be good enough.
In Part 1, Neil traces the line from a traumatic, abusive childhood to the woman who spent 14 years running towards other people's worst moments. They cover growing up without safety, why people from broken homes so often become the ones who protect others and what it actually looks like to be thrown in the deep end on your first day on the job — solo, at a multi-car crash, 40 minutes out of town.
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Chris Alchin grew up in Western Sydney with big ambitions and a double life. By day, he was breaking records in real estate. Behind the scenes, he was deep in a world of bikie clubs, drug trafficking and serious violence — a world that eventually caught up with him.
In this episode, Chris gives Neil an exclusive account of how a kid from Penrith with a strict father and a restless streak ended up at the centre of a drug network, the moment a trusted associate became his undoing and what it actually took to walk away — for good.
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Jimmy Judge went from an angry kid in Townsville to Australian amateur boxing champion — then walked away from it all. Now he's a professional food challenge competitor with a growing online following, and he's about to step back into the ring.
Neil sits down with Jimmy to trace the full journey: a childhood shaped by his mum leaving when he was 11, boxing saving him from himself, winning the Australian title at 17 — then quietly losing the love for it. From bodybuilding to bouncing to the mines, Jimmy's path has been anything but straight. Now he's found his lane in competitive eating, and he breaks down exactly how it works — the water stretching, the flavour fatigue, the dehydration traps — after he and Neil tackled a challenge together the night before.
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