Riverwalk

Summary

Podcast Summary: Criminal – “Riverwalk”

Original Air Date: June 12, 2026
Host: Phoebe Judge
Guest: Patrick Radden Keefe
Episode Description:
An investigative journey into the mysterious death of 19-year-old Zach Brettler in London. “Riverwalk” explores issues of class, identity, deception, and the search for justice through the lens of Zach’s troubled final years, his relationships, and his family’s tireless pursuit of answers.

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Main Theme

This episode unravels the story behind the suspicious death of a young man from a well-off London family, exploring how ambition, lies, and dangerous relationships led to tragedy. It’s a true crime narrative about Zach Brettler—who vanished after a weekend at a luxury apartment complex—and the parents desperate to understand what happened as they battle police indifference, underworld connections, and the complexity of their son’s double life.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Zach Brettler’s Disappearance and the Immediate Aftermath (01:11–03:36)

• Zach, 19, tells his mother Rochelle he’s spending a weekend with a friend at the upscale Riverwalk complex in London, leaving behind his keys and credit cards—an act that worries his mother.
  • “He told her he was going to do a phone detox.” – Patrick Radden Keefe [01:11]
• The next morning, a mysterious, well-dressed chauffeur arrives at the Brettlers’ door, with someone on speakerphone claiming to be Zach's parent from Dubai.
• Rochelle’s call to Zach goes to voicemail. Rochelle and her husband Matthew notify the police out of unease.
• Early depiction: Zach as a bright, quirky, theatrical child with a penchant for jokes and confidence with adults [03:56–04:32].

2. Class, Aspiration, and Deception in Zach’s Teenage Years (05:19–10:39)

• Zach attends the prestigious Mill Hill school. He’s exposed to oligarchs’ children and becomes obsessed with wealth, emulating the lifestyles he sees.
  • "A lot of Zach's classmates...were the children of oligarchs, the children of foreigners...who had huge fortunes." – Patrick [05:19]
• He fights with his parents over status and money (“Why don’t we drive a Bentley?”) and tries various schemes, including reselling cigarettes and items found on campus.
• His behavior escalates to violence—a brief confrontation with his mother leads to therapy, where a psychiatrist notes his “potentially dangerous lack of insight and skewed norms of behavior.” [09:19]
  • “Zach said he was, quote, focused on being wealthy.” – Phoebe [09:19]
• Zach increasingly rejects education, claiming to do real estate deals and business hustles, and shows a desire to be instantly successful.

3. The Emergence of a Secret Double Life (10:39–14:44)

• At 18, Zach claims to have a benefactor—Akbar Shamji—a glamorous, Cambridge-educated businessman, and begins staying at Riverwalk.
• Zach fabricates a persona, using the name “Zach Ismailov,” convincing powerful adults he is a Russian oligarch’s son managing investments in London.
  • “Akbar was saying he was kind of shocked...to learn that [Zach's parents] were Zach’s real parents.” – Phoebe [15:32]
• His parents are suspicious of his new relationships but fear pushing him away by confronting him.
  • “They were worried that if they pushed too hard, they would push him away.” – Patrick [13:56]

4. The Vanishing, the Investigation, and Revelations (14:44–18:39)

• After Zach goes missing, various deceptions unravel: Akbar believed Zach was a billionaire’s son, as did another associate, Varinder “Indian Dave” Sharma.
• Akbar claims Zach confessed to a heroin addiction on the night he disappeared, but his parents doubt this, suspecting Zach was fabricating again.
  • “They believed that Zach might have lied and said this...but they didn’t believe the heroin story for a minute.” – Patrick [18:39]

5. The Discovery: Death at Riverwalk (24:37–30:05)

• Days later, police discover an unidentified male body (later confirmed Zach) in the Thames near Riverwalk.
• CCTV reveals Zach alone on a fifth-floor balcony; moments later, he plummets into the river. Just prior, Akbar is seen returning hurriedly to the complex after receiving a late-night call from Sharma.
  • “The footage shows Zack walking out onto the balcony…then walking to the center and jumping.” – Patrick [28:38]
• Akbar’s behavior—circling the building, peering into the river—raises suspicions, but he maintains he just wanted to look at the view.

6. The Police Response, Parental Pushback, and Troubling Truths (31:41–41:46)

• Initial police efforts seem assuring, but fade amid bureaucracy and COVID delays, prompting Rochelle and Matthew to investigate independently.
• They uncover Zach’s elaborate network of lies and learn their son’s “double life”—including how he assumed a fake name from a neighbor, Zamira Ismailova, and fabricated being from Kazakhstan.
• Evidence from phone records and texts reveals Akbar and Sharma might have tried to extort Zach, thinking he was worth hundreds of millions—though, in reality, Zach was penniless.
  • “He had kind of blown through that money, it turns out, pretending that he was the son of an oligarch... In the days before he died, Zach...had only £4.” – Patrick [35:54]

7. The Suspects and Official Conclusion (39:20–45:18)

• Sharma, with a criminal record (“Indian Dave”), is found dead (overdose/suicide) a year after Zach’s death; Akbar faces bankruptcy but escapes prosecution.
• Texts between Akbar and Sharma show they believed Zach could access millions. Akbar’s ambiguous explanations (“heating up knives and cleaning up blood”) during the inquest sound suspicious but are dismissed as drunken bravado by him.
  • Akbar (via text): "Blood is, quote, a more earthy, streety way of saying bro." [42:53]
• After a public inquest, Zach’s cause of death is officially declared "inconclusive."
  • “The coroner says, could have been suicide, could have been something more sinister. I’m not in a position to say.” – Patrick [45:18]

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• On Zach’s Unpredictable Personality:
  • “He was always a bit of a smart Alex...sometimes you encounter somebody...they’re just kind of fun to talk to because you never know quite what they’re going to come out with next.” – Patrick [03:56]
• On the Impact of Wealth and Aspiration:
  • “Why don’t we drive a Mercedes, why don’t we drive a Bentley? You know, we should really buy a house in this neighborhood.” – Patrick quoting Zach [06:36]
• Parental Regret and Clarity:
  • “Through this process of kind of trying to solve his death, they've come to see him in a way that is more full and complete than they were ever able to when he was alive. And as flawed and complex as he turns out to be, to love him in that complexity.” – Patrick [46:41]
• Official Stonewalling, Parental Frustration:
  • “The lead detective kind of defensively says, you know, I feel like I'm the criminal here and you guys are interviewing me.” – Patrick [41:23]
• On Final Theories:
  • “The Brettlers believe, and I think they’re right, that Zach thought that if he stayed in that apartment, he was going to die...The only chance I have is of making it to the river...had he made it clean into the river, he might actually have survived.” – Patrick [45:50]

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Important Segment Timestamps

• Zach’s Disappearance & Odd Encounter: 01:11–03:36
• School Life & Motivations: 05:19–10:39
• Zach’s Schemes and New Friends: 10:39–14:44
• Emerging Hall of Mirrors; The Heroin Confession: 17:52–18:39
• Discovery of the Body and Early Investigation: 24:37–28:32
• CCTV Revelations & Suspicious Behaviors: 28:38–30:05
• Parent-driven Investigation & Financial Revelations: 31:41–36:13
• Death of Suspect Sharma: 39:20–39:56
• Texts Revealing Motive and Plot: 39:56–41:46
• The Inquest and Akbar’s Testimony: 42:53–45:18
• Final Reflections and Memorial: 46:32–47:38

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Narrative Tone

The episode maintains a sobering, enigmatic, and emotional tone—blending investigative rigor with deep empathy for Zach’s family. Patrick Radden Keefe’s commentary provides narrative suspense and psychological insight, while Phoebe Judge’s measured delivery grounds the emotional elements.

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Conclusion

“Riverwalk” is an intricate exploration of a life cut short by a combination of self-deception, ambition, and proximity to danger. With an investigation muddled by lies, underworld figures, and institutional indifference, Zach Brettler’s story becomes a cautionary tale about class, identity, and the perils of wanting too much. The Brettlers' pursuit of the truth leaves us with an unsettling ambiguity—and a moving portrait of a family's enduring love for a son they are only beginning to fully understand in death.

Transcript

[Phoebe Judge]

Support for Criminal comes from Squarespace. If you're a business owner, you know that it matters how you present your business online. Squarespace has the tools you need to customize your website and advertise all the kinds of services you provide. Plus you can choose the colors and fonts you like. Go to squarespace.com criminal for a free trial. When you're ready to launch, use the offer code criminal to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Support for Criminal comes from Fetch pet insurance. Every six seconds a pet owner in the US gets hit with a vet bill over a thousand dollars. Fetch pet insurance can help. Fetch is a complete pet insurance for dogs and cats. You get paid back up to 90% of vet bills. You can use Fetch for any vet in the US and Canada. All vets are in network. Go to fetchpet.comsave right now for your free quote. That's fetchpet.comsave On November 28, 2019, 19 year old Zach Brettler was living at home with his parents in London. He told his mother, Rochelle, he was going to spend the weekend with a

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

friend just to chill out. He told her he was a little stressed out and he was going to do a phone detox.

[Phoebe Judge]

He told her he was going to be staying in a part of London just a few miles away in a fancy apartment complex called Riverwalk.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

And so as far as Rachelle knew, that was where he would be.

[Phoebe Judge]

Journalist Patrick Radden Keefe, Zach's friend, came to pick him up. And after he left, Rachelle realized Zach had left his keys and credit cards behind. His mother thought that was really odd.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

And so she just texted him and she said, you know, I'm so worried about you. Are you okay if you've gone away for the weekend, you know, aren't you going to need your keys and your wa. Is everything going to be all right? And hours later he texted back and he just wrote all good X.

[Phoebe Judge]

The next morning, Rochelle was at home alone. Her husband Matthew was on a business trip. Around 9:30am she heard the doorbell ring.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

And there was a man that she didn't know standing on the doorstep. A guy who was a kind of middle aged man. He was black, he was elegantly dressed in a suit and a bright tie. And she thought he looked maybe like a chauffeur, like a driver of some sort. And he was holding a phone and the phone had somebody on speaker. And she came to the door and he said, is Zach home? And she said, no, he's not. Who are you? And he Said, who are you? She was a little taken aback, and she said, well, I'm his mom. And at this point, she heard a voice from the phone in this guy's hand, and she could hear this voice say, that can't be his mom. His mum's in Dubai. And she was totally startled. She'd never been to Dubai. But before she could ask any questions, the guy on the doorstep turned around, got into a Range Rover and drove away.

[Phoebe Judge]

After he left, Rochelle tried to call Zach, but her call went straight to voicemail. Then she called her husband Matthew.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

They ended up calling the police. They had a kind of premonition that something might be very wrong.

[Phoebe Judge]

I'm Phoebe Judge. This is criminal. When Zach Brettler was a little kid, his parents described him as bright and a little quirky.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

He was always a bit of a smart Alex. He was a great talker. He was the kid who would put on funny voices. He had a kind of theatricality to him. He would tell jokes. He was always very at ease talking to adults, even when he was a kid. And so he was kind of fun to be around in that respect. You know, he had a sort of slightly jazzy style of conversation. You know, sometimes you encounter somebody and they. They're just kind of fun to talk to because you never know quite what they're going to come out with next. And he had a confidence to him, even as a really young kid.

[Phoebe Judge]

His older brother Joe remembers that once at a family party when Zach was around five, a girl showed something to Zach and asked him, can you read this? Zach told her, I didn't bring my glasses. He used to memorize the electronic sections from shopping catalogs and loved cars, especially fancy sports cars. His favorite was a Bugatti. Zach started going to a school called Mill Hill. He became known as a class clown, and he did well. He joined the tennis team and the cricket team. His parents noticed he started to become obsessed with money. Many of his classmates came from very wealthy families, really wealthy families.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

And so a lot of Zach's classmates were. Were the children of oligarchs, the children of foreigners, often from the former Soviet Union, who had huge fortunes. Billionaires who had a second home in London. They made London their home, in part because they wanted to send their kids to school in London. Zach had never really been exposed to those kinds of people when he was growing up. But at 13, he gets to Mill Hill and he's suddenly surrounded by these classmates, these kind of international students who had swagger and they had money and they had design clothes and on the weekends they would go to fancy restaurants and they'd party at nice hotels. A lot of the kids were boarding students and the dormitory was about an 8 minute walk from class. And on cold days, these kids of oligarchs, they would summon Ubers to bring them to class.

[Phoebe Judge]

Zach started saying how great he thought Vladimir Putin was. His favorite movies were the Wolf of Wall street with Leonardo DiCaprio and War Dogs, about childhood friends who get rich by becoming arms dealers. As a teenager, Zach began fighting with his parents. They argued a lot about money.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

Relle and Matthew were really well off by most standards. They lived in a nice 2000ft apartment in Maida Vale, which is a quite a nice neighborhood in central London. And they were paying to send these two kids to private school. So this was a family that, that by most standards was really privileged. But Zach felt as though he didn't have enough. And so he started to say to his parents, he would say, you know, why don't we. They drove a Mazda, why don't we drive a Mercedes, why don't we drive a Bentley? You know, we should really buy a house in this neighborhood. And the thing is that a house in that neighborhood, you know, could cost $10 million. And so he started to seem a little strange to them because there was a sense of, you know, how much do you want? But over time, he also just got kind of more sullen. I mean, in a way that anybody who's been an adolescent will relate to that. You, you're kind of pulling away from your parents. And I think that Rochelle and Matthew felt that in a, in a painful way, but not in a way that felt like they should sound the alarm.

[Phoebe Judge]

Zach's friends said he talked about starting his own businesses all the time. He tried to convince them to go in on different ideas with him. He got older friends to buy him cartons of cigarettes and would sell them individually to his classmates. He found a storage room where the school kept things left behind by students and began selling those too. He started wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase. After Zach turned 17, his father said Zach changed a lot. Zach's brother had just graduated school and was taking a gap year, while Zach had recently tried to transfer schools and had gotten rejected. He was angry a lot of the time, and Rochelle remembers that Zach was hard to talk to. They argued even more. One night, Zach and Rochelle were home alone.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

Zach started in on, you know, what was a very familiar argument to them at that point about how the family should have a nicer home. And she said something. She made some remark about how he sounded like a spoiled brat. And suddenly Zach's hands were around her throat. And it only lasted a second. And he didn't actually, you know, physically choke her, but it was that kind of impulse to sort of literally to kind of go for the jugular. And she was terrified. And, you know, it was over almost as quickly as it began. But on the other side of that, Rochelle insisted that Zach get into therapy.

[Phoebe Judge]

Zach went to see a psychiatrist who noted that Zach had a somewhat defiant manner. They talked about school and his family. Zach said he was, quote, focused on being wealthy. The psychiatrist said Zach showed, quote, a potentially dangerous lack of insight and skewed norms of behavior. The psychiatrist recommended therapy, but Zach only went to one appointment. And Michelle and Matthew didn't make him keep going. They said after his fight with Rochelle, he seemed to calm down, and they argued less. In 2018, Zach got an internship with a man who owned a chauffeur company. He told his parents he was doing well and doing real business deals.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

They were under the impression that he was making money, that he was, you know, he was actually doing deals. He told them about a real estate deal he'd done where he'd gotten a finder's fee for this luxury apartment that he found for a woman who worked at Chelsea Football Club. He increasingly seems as though he's kind of impatient with school. He's not sure he wants to go to college. He really is in a hurry. You know, he wants to go out and kind of get rich and be out there in the world.

[Phoebe Judge]

Zach told his parents he was going to move out. He said he had met someone who owned multiple apartments in the Riverwalk complex in central London, right next to the Thames, and he was letting Zach stay in one. But by October, Zach was back home. He said he was lonely. Rachelle and Matthew said that during this time, there was a lot about Zach's life they didn't know. Rochelle knew that Zach had been visiting a neighbor, an older Russian woman. She sometimes wondered if they were dating. At one point, Zach showed his father's bank account. It showed he had over £800,000.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

They were really worried about his lifestyle. You know, they were worried he might be dealing drugs or using drugs. They actually kind of surreptitiously got his doctor to do a blood test. I mean, he had a blood test. At a checkup. They asked the doctor to screen the blood for drugs. Came back negative. At one point, they went away on vacation, and they actually installed a hidden camera in the living room of the house, just to see who he might have brought home. But all that came up was, you know, there were some guys from the local tennis club who came back and they would watch tv. They'd just watch movies on the television.

[Phoebe Judge]

Zach told his parents about someone he had been doing business with, a man named Akbar Shamji.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

He told his parents, I've met this guy. He is a really wealthy, really successful, just impressive London businessman. He went to Cambridge University. He's this kind of good looking, glamorous guy in his 40s. He has an apartment on Mount street and Mount street in Mayfair. It's just for those who don't know, London is. Mayfair is one of the fanciest neighborhoods in London and Mount street is one of the fanciest streets. He had two kids who were younger than Zach and he had a wife named Daniela Carnutz, and she was a fashion designer with an atelier in London. And she designed these very high end gowns of the sort that you might wear to the Oscars or something for really well known women. For Princess Kate, for Meghan Markle, for Gwyneth Paltrow, for Michelle Obama. He showed his mother the dresses. That fashion line is called Safiya. The dresses on his iPad. He told his parents that he and Akbar were starting to look at some business deals. And so there were, you know, there was a deal involving cars and a deal involving CBD infused skin care products. And so they were kind of out hustling doing deals. And they didn't meet Akbar at that time. But to his mother and father, it seemed like he'd made friends with this guy who was maybe a mentor and kind of was what Zach wanted to become. So maybe with the help of somebody like Akbar, he could make something of himself. I mean,

[Phoebe Judge]

if I were his parents, I would think I would be thinking, what is a successful 40 year old businessman doing hanging around with my 18 year old son? I mean, you know, were they suspicious at all?

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

I think they were, yeah. I mean, I think it was a very, very difficult period of time for the Brettlers because Zach has turned 18 and he's already kind of trying to pull away and assert himself as an adult. So, yes, they were anxious and suspicious and they didn't really know what the story was, but they were worried that if they pushed too hard, they would push him away.

[Phoebe Judge]

The last time Rachelle saw Zach, on the day he'd left his keys and wallet behind, Akbar Shamji was the friend who had picked him up. Four days passed. The police didn't have any news for Rachelle and Matthew. What's their next step?

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

Rachelle called around to talk to various friends of Zach's, and one of them ended up giving her the phone number for Akbar Shamji.

[Phoebe Judge]

Akbar Shamji agreed to meet them and tell them about the last time he'd seen Zach. He asked them to come to a hotel called the Meridian.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

When they met Akbar, there was something kind of reassuring about him. He's a very elegant, polished guy. And he told them that Zach was a close friend. And he told them that he was really surprised to meet them because he had understood that Zach was not named Zach Brettler at all, that his real name was Zach Ismailov.

[Phoebe Judge]

Akbar Shamji said that he thought Zach was the son of a billionaire Russian oligarch. He had believed that Zach was living in the UK to invest his family's money.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

And so it was this very strange meeting of the two of them because Akbar was saying he was kind of shocked to meet these English parents who aren't billionaires and learn that they were Zach's real parents. And Matthew and Rochelle were shocked to learn that their son might have had this secret alter ego.

[Phoebe Judge]

Akbar Shamji said he had met Zach through a friend named Mark Foley, who managed some real estate for Chelsea Football

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

Club, which is the famous storied soccer team owned by Roman Abramovich, the most famous Russian oligarch. And so you can see how if you're Zach and you think that Putin is great and Roman Abramovich is great, and you're a little obsessed with the oligarch set in London, you meet a guy like Mark Foley who works for Chelsea Football Club. That's a really appealing contact to have. So Zach initially tells Mark Foley that he is the son of an oligarchy. He's the first person Zach tricks. And so Mark Foley arranges a meeting between Zach and Akbar, and that is where their friendship is born.

[Phoebe Judge]

As Akbar talked with Zach's parents, some of what Zach had told Rochelle and Matthew did seem to be true. Akbar said they had sold cars in Romania and Georgia and had made some money with rare earth mineral mining. Akbar told them that after he had picked up Zack on the day he went missing, they drove around the city. Before they went to the Riverwalk complex, they met a man named Virinder Sharma there.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

Varinder was another middle aged guy, and Akbar was a little ambiguous about what Verinder did for a living. He said he was kind of semi retired.

[Phoebe Judge]

Zack's parents pieced together that when Zach had briefly moved out he'd actually been staying with Virinder Sharma. Akbar said that on the way to Riverwalk, Zach said he needed to tell him something.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

Zach had confessed to him that Zach was addicted to heroin.

[Phoebe Judge]

As Akbar told Rochelle and Matthew, he took Zach to the Riverwalk complex, where Zach then confessed about his heroin addiction and to Vrinda Sharma. Akbar said that the three of them talked for a while, and by the end of the night, they'd all agreed that Zach would go to a rehab clinic. In the morning, Akbar said he left Verinder and Zach at the apartment. He said Verinder called him in the morning and said Zach was gone. What did Zach's parents think when they heard about heroin? Did they believe that that could be a possibility?

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

So all of this, you can imagine, was a lot coming at Matthew and Rochelle. And there was an interesting thing where when they heard that he'd been pretending that he was the son of a Russian oligarch, it was completely shocking, but they believed it. They could sort of see some version of their son who could find his way to telling that kind of story. When they heard from Akbar that Zach was addicted to heroin, neither of them believed it for a second. And, you know, it wasn't that they had some kind of parental fantasy that their kid couldn't take drugs. It's just that heroin didn't seem to be Zach's kind of thing. They thought, if anything, it would be cocaine. And, you know, Zach had been living with them. They thought it was. It would have been difficult for him to kind of carry on a heroin addiction and be living with them, and they would never pick up on any of the signs. This was a kid who got up in the morning and took long runs along the Thames. It just didn't seem right. Now, they did believe that Zach might have told Akbar that he was addicted to heroin, but they thought that if he said something like that, it was probably because he was scared or he wanted pity. You know, Zach was always the kid in school who would feign a migraine on the day of the examination. He often would come up with stories that he would tell in order to kind of get out of doing something or get somebody to feel bad for him. So they believed that Zach might have lied and said this to Akbar, but they didn't believe the heroine story for a minute.

[Phoebe Judge]

And what do they think about Akbar? I mean, he's more their peer than Zack's peer. I mean, you know, age wise, they

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

recorded that first conversation. They actually recorded it on an iPhone. And eventually, they Let me listen to the recording. And I think they were so reassured by Akbar. They were so grateful to him for his help. In that moment, they thought, this is a guy who actually kind of got burned by our son. He's like a real serious grownup with a professional life and a lot of money, clearly. And our son sort of wheedled his way into this guy's life pretending to be something he wasn't. And Akbar has just learned that Zach was lying about all that. That, and yet he seems very kind. And he keeps saying, the most important thing is we've got to get Zach home. We got to get him back safe.

[Phoebe Judge]

Akbar Shamji introduced the Brettlers to Verinder Sharma over the phone. Verinder also thought Zach was a billionaire. Zach had told him that he wasn't speaking to his mother because of a problem with his inheritance. He had said his mother and the rest of his family were all in Dubai. Verinder said, I didn't think someone could lie to that extent. Rochelle and Matthew apologized to both men for Zach's lies. Verinder said the only thing that mattered was getting Zach back. They all agreed to stay in touch. The next day, two police officers came to the Brettlers home. They said a body had been found in the Thames. We'll be right back to listen without ads Join Criminal plus. Thanks to Squarespace for their support. Making a website can be intimidating, especially because it's often the first thing people see about your business. If you want to build a website that makes a great first impression on people, you don't need years of coding experience. You just need Squarespace. It's the all in one website platform made to help you stand out online. Squarespace has the tools you need to make your website look exactly how you want it to look. Sell your services and get paid. No matter what business you're in. You can choose from a library of templates designed by professionals. Or if you don't want to scroll through all the template options, Squarespace's blueprint AI can build a website for you in just a couple of minutes based on a few prompts. It'll pull from different templates. To create the website you need, go to squarespace.com criminal for a free trial. When you're ready to launch, use the offer code criminal to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Support for Criminal comes from Cachava. No two people make their green smoothies exactly the same. But if you're looking to add a bit of extra nutrition to yours, you might like cachava. When I start my mornings with a green smoothie, I throw in whatever I have available. Some mornings it's spinach, other times it's kale. Either way, it's very easy to add a few scoops of cachava before blending it all together. Cachava is an all in one shake that can help with your energy, digestion, immunity and more. It's made with high quality ingredients without any artificial flavors, colors or sweeteners. It's just clean nutrition to fuel you wherever your day takes you. Their new travel packs make it even easier to do that. You can just throw one in your bag. One packet provides lots of protein, fiber, vitamins, minerals, greens, probiotics, omegas, electrolytes and more. Take your daily ritual with you. Go to kachava.com and use code criminal for 15% off your first order. That's Kachava. K-A C-H-A-V A.com code criminal. On November 29, 2019, police were called to the Thames. They had received a report that there was a body on the riverbank in front of the Riverwalk complex.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

This initially is a John Doe investigation. The body had no id, no tattoos. There was no suggestion of who this person was.

[Phoebe Judge]

He had no shirt on or shoes, just sweatpants and socks. The police assumed that he had jumped off a bridge somewhere else and and that the body had drifted downriver through the night. About 30 people are found every year in the Thames. Most of them are people who died by suicide. The body was taken to the police station and then the mortuary police began trying to ID him.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

If you imagine how big London is and how big the Metropolitan Police, Scotland Yard is, you have this kind of bizarre situation where there's this body, they don't know who it is. And in another part of the city, there's a missing persons investigation that starts where they're looking for this missing kid, Zach Brettler. And the left hand and the right hand aren't talking for about four or five days. And finally the police put it together. They realize that the body found out in front of the building was the same kid who went missing.

[Phoebe Judge]

On December 5, 2019, police arrested Virinder Sharma on suspicion of murder. Zach had told his parents Varinder Sharma was a rubber tycoon. But police knew that Vrinder Sharma had a long criminal record. He was also known as Indian Dave. Police had investigated him for drug smuggling and potential involvement in a homicide from a drive by shooting with an AK47. At one point, he Faked his death when he was charged with blackmail, but he'd actually gone into hiding in Monaco. There were accounts that he would hold people over the sides of buildings so they would pay back their loans. When he was questioned about the night that Zach died, Varinder Sharma said he believed that Zach had killed himself. He said he had fallen asleep after midnight. He'd been drinking whiskey and had taken a sleeping pill, so he didn't remember much about the night. He said Zack had been crying and was upset about his heroin addiction, but that by the end of the night, they had hugged. He said, I would like to state for the record that I was not responsible for Zach's death in any way. When officers asked him more questions, he answered, no comment, which is the English

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

equivalent of pleading the Fifth. You know, this is a guy who was a very seasoned, hardcore English gangster who'd been in prison and had been investigated for murder. And he did what those kinds of hard men tend to do in these situations, which is he totally clamped up.

[Phoebe Judge]

Police had also arrested Akbar Shamji. He told them he thought that Zach was, quote, kind of slightly schizophrenic. Akbar Shamji told police that on the night of November 28, he went home and his wife had been angry with him for staying out so late, so he'd slept in his car. But the police officers had evidence that he was lying. They had footage from CCTV cameras from the night that Zach died.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

When they looked at the CCTV footage, he was there. And then he left and he drove away. And then Akbar didn't drive home. He actually just kind of drove around the area as if he was sort of hanging out just in case. And it was late at night. You know, this is 1, 2 in the morning. And Zach was alone in the apartment with sharma for about 20 or 30 minutes. And then at a certain point, Indy and Dave called him. We know that from the phone records.

[Phoebe Judge]

The phone record showed that around 2am, Virinder called Akbar.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

And as soon as Akbar got that call, he turned his car around and he started speeding back to Riverwalk. He heard something on that call that made him desperate to get back there. And he pulls up in front of the building and gets out of the car and goes in and starts heading up. And just at the moment, he pulls up in front of the building. The footage shows Zack walking out onto the balcony and walking over to one end and seeming to kind of look over the side and then walking over to the other and then walking to the center and jumping. So moments after Zack goes off the balcony. Akbar goes into the apartment. He's in there for about 15 minutes. We don't know what happens when he's inside because he wouldn't tell the police and neither would Sharma. But afterwards, Akbar goes downstairs and you think he's gonna go home again. Instead, he walks around the building to the other side, which is where the river is. And he walks right over to the river, and there's a river wall there. And he walks right over to exactly the point where Zak had just gone into the river. And the cameras capture Akbar Shamji leaning over and looking down into the river at just the point where Zach's just gone into it. Then he straightens up, walks back around the building, gets into his car, and drives home.

[Phoebe Judge]

Police asked why Akbar Shamji had gone to look in the river. He said, it's a nice bit of the river. One police officer said it seemed like too much of a coincidence. But Akbar said that he would have called the police if he had seen Zach. One week after Zach's death, Rochelle and Matthew met with the lead detective, a man named Rory Wilkinson. He explained that Zach had several injuries, most of them related to his fall. But the police said he had a broken jaw that they couldn't explain. Detective Wilkinson said police had video showing Zach alone on the fifth floor balcony. But he said, if someone is so scared that they jump, even if it's of their own volition, that still is obviously a criminal offense, possibly murder. Police officers had also searched Verinder Sharma's apartment and found Zach's phone broken in two. It wasn't his main phone that he used to text with his parents. It was a burner phone with special encryption. But police didn't have enough evidence to hold Akbar Shamji or Varinder Sharma. Both men were released on Bailey. How do Zach's parents feel the investigation is going? You know, when the police start, are they happy with the information they're getting?

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

Initially, the police were very reassuring and they said, listen, you know, this is Scotland Yard. It's one of the biggest, most well resourced police departments in the world. We will leave no sense stone unturned. The Brettlers basically took it for granted that the police would do what they said that they would do. And so initially they, I think, felt as though it was in good hands. But then the COVID pandemic kicks in and things kind of slow down and they're not sure how much of the non responsiveness of the cops is a function of COVID and how much of it is that they seem to have sort of lost the thread on the investigation. And over time, they become more and more uneasy. And so Rochelle and Matthew, rather than be passive, feel as though they owe it to their son to get to the bottom of what happened to him.

[Phoebe Judge]

Matthew and Rachelle had also hired a private investigator after Zach had gone missing. They started calling Zach's friends to find out for themselves what the last few weeks of his life had been like. One friend said that a few days before he died, he'd noticed Zach kept checking his surroundings. Zach said he was thinking of going to the police because he was being threatened. But his friends weren't always sure if what Zach said was real. He claimed that his father was an arms dealer. Later, Rochelle found out that when Zach was 13, during his first year at Mill Hill, he told his classmates that his mother had died. She learned that the neighbor she thought Zach had been dating, a woman named Zamira, had believed Zach was from Kazakhstan, she was from Russia, and they had become friends. She sometimes made Zach food and had once invited him to celebrate New Year's with her family. Sometimes when they talked, Zach threw in a word of Russian. Relle learned that her full name was Zamira Ismailova. Zach had used her last name for his fake identity with Akbar Shamji and Verinder Sharma. Rochelle and Matthew began to worry that the two men had been trying to extort money from Zack.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

They eventually start learning more about the gangster past of Verinder Sharma. And Akbar, it turns out, has a very checkered history in terms of his business and his life. And in fact, in the months before he meets Zach Brettler, Akbar has actually declared bankruptcy. Now, you wouldn't know it. He's still living a very lux lifestyle with the apartment on Mount street, and he meets people at these various private clubs that he's a member of, but he's actually in some financial trouble at the point where this young kid who says that he is the son of a billionaire oligarch suddenly wanders into his life.

[Phoebe Judge]

And where did Zack fall in this threesome?

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

Zack was adopted by them, basically as a kind of friend and protege. He would spend time with their families, with Akbar's kids, with Indian Dave's kids. And so he really kind of, in that sort of classic way with Zach, he went from not knowing people at all to ingratiating himself with them really quickly. I think they were amused by him. I think they absolutely were enticed by the idea that he might have access to hundreds of millions of dollars that he could help them out with or he could channel some of that money in. The problem was he kept telling all these stories about how he was going to come through with money and investments, and the money itself never materialized.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rochelle and Matthew check Zach's bank account. They had saved checks from his grandparents over the years and money he'd gotten from his bar mitzvah and put it in a savings account. They'd given it all to him after he turned 18. It was about £18,000.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

He had kind of blown through that money, it turns out, pretending that he was the son of an oligarch, you know, paying for meals, doing this and that, kind of here and there to seem incredibly like a rich person. And in the days before he died, Zach, in his bank account had only £4. He was close to empty.

[Phoebe Judge]

They tried to contact some of the people Zach had said he was doing business with, but they said they didn't know anything that could help them. Zach's father, Matthew, spoke with the owner of a cafe in one of the Riverwalk's buildings. He'd been there the morning Zach's body had been found by the Thames. He helped them get in touch with some of the doormen from Riverwalk. And then at the end of 2020, the lead detective on Zach's case called with news Varinder Sharma had been found dead. We'll be right back. Support for Criminal comes from Bombas. If your sock drawer could use an upgrade, Bombas has a range of well designed socks like their sports socks, which are made with a cushioned sweat wicking design that also stops them from sliding down your foot while you're in motion. And Bombus has more than socks. They also make soft and breathable basics, including underwear and T shirts. This spring, I look forward to going on longer runs wearing my new Bombas run socks. They're soft and lightweight, made with a mesh knit that makes them breathable. And they're designed with cushioning in the heel and toe to protect your feet. Bombus also has a mission. For every item you purchase, they say they donate an item of clothing to someone facing housing insecurity. They say they've made over 150 million donations and counting. You can go to bombas.com criminal and use code criminal for 20% off your first purchase. That's B O M B-A-S.com criminal code criminal. checkout, I keep seeing celebrities posts me in the 90s versus now, while the person staring at me in the mirror is definitely not the same person that could pull off boot Cut jeans. Time creeps up on us so slowly you don't see it until suddenly you do. Same thing goes for your bills. A dollar here, an uptick there. It's a slow burn until one day you realize the price you're paying now is way higher than when you signed up. But AT T Mobile customers had the lowest wireless bills versus Verizon and ATT over the past five years. And with T Mobile on their experience plans, you get a five year price guarantee so you know exactly what your plan price will be for the next five years. So at least that's one thing that won't change over time. I can't guarantee you'll still look good with frosted tips, but T Mobile can give you a clear guarantee on your wireless plan.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

Lower bills based on Harris X billing

[Phoebe Judge]

snapshots from Q3.21 to Q4 25 can be compared to average AT&T and Verizon bills. Comparison excludes discounts, credits and optional charges. Price guarantee on talk text and data exclusions like taxes and fees apply. CT mobile.com In December of 2020, Varinder Sharma had been found dead in his apartment. Police believed he had died from a drug overdose.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

This is a year after Zach's death, almost to the week. But the officer who told them about it was a little ambiguous. He said it might have been a suicide, it might have been an overdose. He didn't really know the details and he said he wasn't able to learn the details. He said, we're being kind of kept sterile from that part of the investigation. And they were confused by this. If you're leading a murder investigation and your lead suspect dies, why it is that if you were that cop, you would be kept sterile from knowing the circumstances of that death.

[Phoebe Judge]

A year later, Detective Wilkinson asked to meet with Relle and Matthew. He had an update on the investigation. He told them that he wouldn't be able to give them a copy of the case files, but he would read everything aloud and they could record it. Rochelle and Matthew were told about text messages on Verinder Sharma's phone that in the days leading up to his death, Akbar and Verinder no longer trusted Zach. Varinder Sharma had written to Akbar trying to find out how much money Zach had and texted that they should take Zach to an ATM. He also texted, I want 5% of that 205 million. Akbar sent a voice memo back and said, I'm highly skeptical about this 205 million. Verinder responded, saying that they were owed 50% of everything. Zach owned. The night Zach died, Akbar had texted another man that he had been, quote, heating up the knives and clearing up blood. Matthew and Rochelle asked if the police had interviewed that man. They said no. They also learned the police had not interviewed the chauffeur who knocked on the door and told Rachelle that she couldn't be Zach's mother. It had been two years since Zach died.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

The cops really had very few answers and basically kept sort of suggesting, well, you know, maybe he just committed suicide. Maybe that's what this is. And at that point, the Brettlers were a little bit more aggressive because they had really done more homework than the police had. And the lead detective kind of defensively says, you know, I feel like I'm the criminal here and you guys are interviewing me. You know, you're interrog me.

[Phoebe Judge]

In February of 2022, prosecutors in London said they would not file charges against Akbar Shamji in connection with Zach Brettler's death. Ten months later, about three years after Zach had died, the coroner's office held a public inquest about his death.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

Anytime there's a death in the UK that is unnatural or kind of unclear, ambiguous, there's what's called an inquest. And it's an interesting procedure. It looks a little bit like a judicial inquiry. There's a coroner who acts essentially like a judge. You have evidence presented. It's a somewhat adversarial situation in the sense that the Brettlers in this case had a lawyer who was able to cross examine witnesses. And so this was kind of their last bite at the apple in terms of an opportunity to really try and get to the bottom of what had happened to Zach. In some ways, it was very dramatic in the sense that they were able to kind of confront, face to face, some of these people who clearly knew more than they were saying about the circumstances of Zach's death.

[Phoebe Judge]

The coroner said at the beginning of the inquest, we're here simply to find the answers to four who the deceased was, where he died, when he died, and how he came by his death. Akbar Shamji testified over video call he had left London and was now working at a cryptocurrency company. He spoke for several hours. Matthew and Rochelle's lawyer asked Akbar about the text Verinder had sent him, saying he wanted 5% of that 205 million. Akbar said that Zach was always promising huge sums of money. I pretty clearly told Sharma, I don't think there's any golden pot at the end of that rainbow. The Brettler's lawyer also Asked about some of the texts Akbar had sent before Zach died, including the one where he said he was heating up knives and cleaning up blood. Akbar said he was, quote, a little bit drunk. He said he hadn't meant literal blood. He said that blood is, quote, a more earthy, streety way of saying bro. The lawyer asked about the nine minute call between Verinder and Akbar at around 2am that ended just a few minutes before Zach had jumped from the balcony. Akbar said he didn't remember what they had talked about. The lawyer asked if Verinder Sharma had seemed angry. Akbar said everything was fine. The coroner asked Akbar if he had ever talked with Virinder about what happened that night. Akbar said, I never push too hard. I'm not sure what kind of hornet's nest I would have been kicking. When his testimony was done, the coroner allowed Akbar Shamji to continue listening to the rest of the inquest over video call. Most of the time he kept his camera off, but at one point he accidentally turned it on and the courtroom realized he'd taken his computer to the bathroom where he was taking a shower. The inquest took two days. At the end, the coroner's official finding was that the cause of Zach's death was inconclusive.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

The coroner says, could have been suicide, could have been something more sinister. I'm not in a position to say. And so the Brettlers come out of that really kind of shimmering with fury because they feel as though this was the last opportunity when the authorities, the British authorities, could help them find answers about the death of their son. And they were let down once again.

[Phoebe Judge]

What do Rochelle and Matthew think happened to Zach?

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

The rattlers believe, and I think they're right, that Zach thought that if he stayed in that apartment, he was going to die. And so he went out onto the balcony and he did a swan dive. He thought, the only chance I have is of making it to the river. And it was a fifth floor balcony. And the worst part of this is that had he made it clean into the river, he might actually have survived. He probably would have been quite badly hurt jumping into the river from that height, but he might have survived. But on his way down, his hip clipped the embankment wall and so he died in the water.

[Phoebe Judge]

Patrick Radden Keefe wrote a book about Zach Brettler. After he finished it, Rochelle invited him to visit.

[Patrick Radden Keefe]

It was last September. And Rachelle wrote to me and said, we're going to have a little ceremony at our home to mark what would have been his 25th birthday. And it was about 30 or 40 people, friends and family, people who knew Zach and loved him. And it was the most extraordinary thing. It was actually kind of a joyous event. It was a celebration of his life. I think that Rochelle and Matthew and Joe, Zach's brother, they think a lot about Zach and they try and honor his memory, but in kind of a strange way, through this process of kind of trying to solve his death, they've come to see him in a way that is more full and complete than they were ever able to when he was alive. And as flawed and complex as he turns out to be, to love him in that complexity,

[Phoebe Judge]

Rochella said, Zach always stretched the truth a little. He should have been an actor. He should have been a writer. Zach's brother Joe told Patrick that he sometimes has dreams about his brother. He said they were usually happy dreams of Zach when he was younger. In January of 2025, the Brettlers met with two senior officers with the Metropolitan Police. One of the officers said that he still talked with the lead detective from the investigation, Rory Wilkinson, about Zach Almost every week Foreign. Is created by Lauren Spore and me. Nadia Wilson is our senior producer. Katie Bishop is our supervising producer. Our producers are Susanna Roberson, Jackie Sajiko, Lily Clark and Lena Sillison. This episode was fact checked by Katie Cederborg. Our show is mixed and engineered by Veronica Simonetti. Julian Alexander makes original illustrations for each episode of Criminal. You can see [e-mail] and you can sign up for a newsletter at thisiscriminal.com Newsletter Patrick Radden Keefe's book is called London Falling. We hope you'll consider supporting our work by joining our membership program Criminal. Plus you can listen to Criminal this is Love and Phoebe reads a Mystery without any ads. Plus you'll get bonus episodes. These are special episodes with me and Criminal co creator Lauren Sporer talking about everything from how we make our episodes to the crime stories that caught our attention that week, to things we've been enjoying lately. To learn more, go to patreon.com criminal we're on Facebook at this is Criminal and Instagram and TikTok at Criminal Underscore Podcast. We're also on [e-mail] criminalpodcast criminal is part of the Vox Media Podcast network. Discover more great [e-mail] I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal. Are you one of those media strategy people clicking through slides scrolling spreadsheets? Yes. Good. This is for you because on Spotify there's an audience that's different. Locked in, loyal, invested. They're called fans. Fans don't just listen to music. They feel seen by it like it belongs to them. So when your brand shows up on Spotify, that's who you're talking to. And you're right next to artists like me, Lizzo. So are you ready to talk to fans? Spotify advertising. You're among fans.