The mystery man now claimed that Wesley had contacted him. Wesley was already under the impression that I was the mastermind behind this campaign to expose his crimes. Now apparently Wesley was offering him $35,000 to disclose the evidence that would prove his suspicions. He explained that even though Wesley had wronged him in the past, that was an amount of money that he would find it very difficult to refuse given his current financial situation.
I didn’t like where this was going. I could see that he was trying to pit me and Wesley in a bidding war against each other - not a very honorable move, given that all I had done was try to help him. However, I also acknowledged that I had been very non-committal thus far.
I did not want to give Wesley the opportunity to bury the evidence. I also did not want the mystery man to turn on me and make it look like the whole campaign was originated by me. Because it wasn’t.
I reluctantly agreed to his request for a “gesture of goodwill” in transferring him $2,500 upfront to honor our original agreement.
Bidding War
When it came to making the transfer, he suggested that I do it via WISE. He provided some account details in the name of his friend ‘Ben Li’, but when I entered them into the WISE app, I was alerted to the fact that the name did not match the account details.
Then, WISE revealed his real name to me: Russell Thamer.
When I confronted him about this, he admitted that he was indeed Russell Thamer, and that he gave me a different name because he wanted to remain anonymous. Yet, the account numbers that he provided were his own. He had never intended for ‘Ben’ to receive the money, and had been caught in a white lie. While this was extremely concerning to me, Russell insisted that this was actually a positive development. Now that I knew his real name, I should feel more assured in my dealings with him.
Now that I had caught Russell in a lie, I felt a need to make sure that the rest of what he had told me was true. I asked him to reconfirm his claims. I also asked for evidence. Particularly in regards to his claims about the burglary. Even though I was not fond of Wesley, I did not want to fund the publication of any false information, and I made this clear.
In short, I was only interested in outing Wesley if he was in fact guilty. I was never interested in smearing the reputation of an innocent person, no matter how much I disliked them.
Over the next few days, Russell restated his allegations, and also produced a detailed inventory of evidence that he had.
In hindsight, perhaps I could have done a bit more due diligence. For example, I could have called the London Metropolitan Police to enquire about the details of the alleged burglary. However, there was a very high probability that no details would be forthcoming. Many law enforcement agencies have a strict confidentiality policy.
I believe that most reasonable people, when presented with this evidence, would have believed that Wesley was guilty. However, I will admit that I was not objective. I was biased against Wesley, and so I was much more likely to believe that Russell was telling the truth.
On August 31, Russell sent me a draft document titled ‘Unmasking the International Scam Artist Known as Wesley - Real Name: Wenzhi Fei’. He intended for this text to be published on the internet. This document contained two main allegations, namely (1) that Russell and friends had lost $250,000 in a crypto scam perpetrated by Wesley, and (2) that Wesley had hired thugs to burglarize Russell’s home after he reported the fraud to his bank.
The document was badly written. The grammar and the overall structure were both poor, and it was stylistically ineffective in advancing his argument. As such, I offered to help edit his writing. I purely made language and style edits to improve the ‘packaging’ of the content. I did not make any changes to the substantive content of the document, nor did I introduce any new allegations against Wesley. I sent the edited version to Russell via email, and he later used this almost in its entirety when he published his website on September 3.
These text exchanges clearly show that Russell was the author of the first draft of the ‘Uncovering Wesley’ website. He sent me the draft on August 31, 2023.
Because it was so poorly written, I offered to help edit it.
Flipping The Tables
Weeks later, Russell created a video of him logging into his Gmail account and opening an email sent by ‘Ben L’ containing an attachment. He used this video as ‘proof’ of his new claim that I was the originator of the entire campaign against Wesley and had deliberately fabricated false accusations and evidence against him due to a personal vendetta. This is a completely false characterization of events.
Even after his scam was exposed, he attempted to blackmail me for more money. He threatened to release this video to Wesley as well as to the general public. He claimed that Wesley would be able to sue me for defamation (libel).
Did I send the email? Yes, I did.
Does the email contain an attachment containing the text that was later published on the ‘Uncovering Wesley’ website? Yes, it did.
In reality, however, I was merely editing his original draft and sending it back to him. I did not initiate the project. I also did not invent or fabricate any facts. At all material times during which I was providing support to Russell, I was doing so because I genuinely believed that the allegations were genuine.
I am posting Russell’s blackmail video here for the public to see.
Playing Both Sides
While preparing to launch the ‘Uncovering Wesley’ website, Russell reached out to Wesley in an attempt to extort him for money. He claimed that there was a conspiracy to destroy Wesley’s image and reputation, and offered to name the person responsible for $35,000. He further claimed that Wesley was already under investigation for various offenses. See this screenshot provided by Wesley.
Even though he was clearly the one who approached Wesley, he claimed to me that Wesley had approached him. Because Wesley and I were not speaking at the time, neither of us had any idea what was going on.
