# Introducing Badge Of Betrayal

An episode of [Badge of Betrayal](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1852919243), 14 Nov 2025, 6:11.

Audio: https://p.podderapp.com/2544644999/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/2fb3740d-3436-44af-8cc0-a91900716aa5/fbab9570-a7a3-4fd4-a673-b3940044b1b8/13a9488f-0e04-441e-84f3-b3950027d962/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=2f1fa4b5-119b-41b5-8749-b3940044b5a4

He was a senior cop. A coach. A mentor. A familiar face in Tasmania. But when officers arrived at Paul Reynolds’ door with a search warrant, the truth began to crack open exposing decades of grooming, suspicion, and warnings buried deep inside the system meant to stop him. Badge of Betrayal peels back the layers of a case Tasmania Police quietly walked away from after Reynolds’ sudden death. What emerges is a disturbing pattern: young boys targeted through sport, car meets, and friendship; colleagues who raised concerns and were shut down; and a network of silence that stretched far beyond one man. A current serving high-ranking police officer comes forward to tell us everything he knows, a friend who was groomed by Reynolds talks, and we speak with victim survivors and whistleblowers and uncover emails and files with notes that leave breadcrumbs that ask more questions. From the creators of Our Little Edey, this is a forensic investigation into one of Tasmania’s most unsettling police scandals and the uncomfortable question at its core: If the badge is supposed to protect us… what happens when it protects the predator instead if you have information that you would like to share, email us anonymously at podshape@proton.me See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:10] Speaker 1: Senior Sergeant Paul Reynolds, badge 1466, a respected Tasmanian cop.
[0:17] Speaker 2: In a career spanning nearly four decades, Paul Reynolds was
[0:21] Speaker 2: one of the first officers on the scene of the
[0:23] Speaker 2: Port Arthur massacre and played a key role when the
[0:27] Speaker 2: Beaconsfield gold mine collapsed.
[0:29] Speaker 1: They're alive, they're reasonably well and they've been rescued. That's
[0:33] Speaker 1: the news the nation has been waiting to hear from
[0:35] Speaker 1: Beaconsfield in northern Tasmania. Until one September evening in 2018
[0:41] Speaker 1: when four police officers knock on his door with a
[0:44] Speaker 1: search warrant. The allegation... is that Reynolds is a pedophile.
[0:55] Speaker 1: The next day, Reynolds is dead.
[1:06] Speaker 3: When he took his own life in 2018, former police
[1:10] Speaker 3: officer Paul Reynolds was given a hero's send-off. despite being
[1:15] Speaker 3: under investigation for child sexual abuse.
[1:19] Speaker 1: And that's just where this story begins, not ends. I'm
[1:28] Speaker 1: Jay Walkerton, and you might know me from Our Little Edie.
[1:31] Speaker 4: I go running across the road.
[1:34] Speaker 1: I said, is it Eden? Is Eden here? And I
[1:38] Speaker 1: remember saying, I don't want to see her dead. She said,
[1:42] Speaker 1: she's dead. We've lost her. As we've dug into the
[1:46] Speaker 1: Eden Westbrook case over the last three years, Reynolds' name
[1:49] Speaker 1: keeps resurfacing again and again.
[1:53] Speaker 4: He shared that he was the liaison officer from Launceston,
[2:00] Speaker 4: coronial office.
[2:02] Speaker 5: He was the final card of the stamp of Eden's
[2:04] Speaker 5: report and liaisoning with the coroner. I've always said a
[2:08] Speaker 5: report is as honest as the person that's writing the
[2:11] Speaker 5: diary or the report. How honest was Paul Reynolds.
[2:17] Speaker 4: He had completely fooled me on what kind of a
[2:20] Speaker 4: character he was. I believed in him and I shared
[2:23] Speaker 4: so much of what I was feeling with him on
[2:26] Speaker 4: a personal level that I didn't share with anybody else.
[2:28] Speaker 1: According to an independent review into Reynolds, he groomed teenage
[2:32] Speaker 1: boys for decades.
[2:34] Speaker 7: He was a master at it. He groomed victims. He
[2:38] Speaker 7: groomed their parents. He groomed the communities, the sporting clubs.
[2:44] Speaker 7: He groomed his own colleagues.
[2:46] Speaker 1: All while wearing the badge.
[2:49] Speaker 7: This is the most prolific grooming I have seen perpetrated
[2:54] Speaker 7: by one person in my career.
[2:58] Speaker 1: In this new podcast, we've talked to friends who knew him.
[3:02] Speaker 1: He was definitely a lot like us.
[3:04] Speaker 8: He'd talk about his sex life, he'd make sexually suggestive comments.
[3:11] Speaker 8: The naivety there was definitely there, because you just saw
[3:14] Speaker 8: him as.
[3:15] Speaker 1: One of you, basically. whistleblowers who know more. I've just
[3:21] Speaker 1: had the contact from Fire Signal and it means that
[3:27] Speaker 1: I'm going to drive to see this person that my
[3:30] Speaker 1: contact's given me.
[3:31] Speaker 9: I've been a lifelong or a career police officer, 20
[3:38] Speaker 9: years plus experience.
[3:42] Speaker 6: No-one has been held accountable and, in fact, the Weese
[3:44] Speaker 6: inquiry didn't discover who participated in the discussions for giving
[3:49] Speaker 6: Reynolds a state funeral. As a person they knew to
[3:53] Speaker 6: be a serial sex offender, at that stage, not one
[3:56] Speaker 6: person has been found to be accountable for doing that.
[4:01] Speaker 1: The evidence points to the police knew about Reynolds' behaviour
[4:05] Speaker 1: since at least 2008. I'm devastated and....
[4:12] Speaker 7: I think it's probably had more of an emotional impact
[4:15] Speaker 7: because of the report I made in 2008.
[4:18] Speaker 4: I feel very disappointed.
[4:23] Speaker 1: Was Reynolds protected by a camaraderie? Who knew? And who
[4:28] Speaker 1: stayed silent? And what else has been buried?
[4:33] Speaker 7: Your report notifying this office of Inspector Reynolds' formal counselling
[4:37] Speaker 7: on the 17th of February 2012.
[4:38] Speaker 4: This matter was assigned to Inspector Reynolds to manage.
[4:41] Speaker 8: There is no.
[4:41] Speaker 2: Evidence of him abusing Ashley Youth Detention Center detainees either
[4:45] Speaker 2: privately or during the course of his duties.
[4:47] Speaker 9: As a police officer.
[4:50] Speaker 6: As a general rule, police don't like bad publicity. They
[4:55] Speaker 6: don't like people breaking ranks, so to speak.
[4:57] Speaker 1: And it can be.
[4:58] Speaker 6: Very limiting if you are either believed or found guilty
[5:01] Speaker 6: To be breaking ranks and talking, you know, against the organisation.
[5:07] Speaker 4: There will be no protecting the institution.
[5:11] Speaker 1: From the producers of Our Little Lady, this is Badge
[5:15] Speaker 1: of Betrayal, an investigation Tasmanian police never wanted you to hear.
[5:19] Speaker 9: It's a pretty lonely place in what is already a
[5:24] Speaker 9: very difficult job.
[5:25] Speaker 1: Do you have knowledge of widespread corruption within the Tasmanian
[5:28] Speaker 1: police force? Badger Betrayal, coming to your favorite podcast app
[5:32] Speaker 1: from Monday, November 24.

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