Another man involved with the movie Sound of Freedom has been accused of sexual misconduct, this time for groping the breasts of an allegedly underage sex trafficking victim.
Paul Hutchinson served as executive producer of the film, which follows Tim Ballard, founder of Operation Underground Railroad (OUR), and his efforts to combat child trafficking.
Hutchinson, who was an investor in the film and worked as an operative for OUR, touched the breasts in 2016 while on an operation in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.
Angel Studios
The incident was captured on video by OUR. While Hutchinson has not denied it happened, he has said the trafficking victim was over 18 at the time, according to a report in Vice News.
Newsweek has reached out to Hutchinson via email through the Child Liberation Foundation, with which he is currently affiliated after leaving OUR.
“There is a lot to the story, a very dangerous situation and I am happy to let the world know the details when the time is right,” he told Vice.
“Every operator who was present stands behind me in how I reacted to the situation. I have zero reservations as to how I handled myself undercover.
“You don’t find trafficked children in the lobby of the Ritz-Carlton. We had to go to the most dangerous places on the planet to find the children.
“All my undercover work was done with integrity and honor.”
The footage was obtained by the Davis County Attorney’s Office, in Utah, during an FBI criminal investigation into Ballard and OUR. The office wrote a detailed description of what occurred in the footage, which had been filmed for a documentary film and TV series called The Abolitionists.
“Video footage depicts operations conducted by Operation Underground Railroad… During this portion of video reviewed there was an incident between, Paul Hutchinson, (dob 11/04/1970) and an underage female approximately 16 years old,” the description read.
The report detailed how the footage featured an “ear cam” where Hutchinson could be heard speaking to an alleged trafficker who offered for him to touch the girl’s breasts.
After the incident, one of the OUR operatives says in the video: “Let’s get the hell out of here,” to which Hutchinson replies: “Yeah, let’s get out of here, I’m down a grand.”
“For a thousand bucks you got your hands on some breasts,” said a male voice as others around him laugh.
“What was I going to do?” asked a second male voice “OK, she’s 16, here, feel them, they’re nice. I’m like, shit, those are 16.”
“You think they’re underage, huh?” asked the first male voice.
“Oh yeah, I would put money on that,” said a third male voice.
“I don’t know how wise it was to grab that girl’s boobs, though,” said the second male voice.
“You didn’t get that on video or anything, did you?” asked the first male voice.
A handwritten note on the report said “OUR thought they had scrubbed this,” referring to the footage of the incident between Hutchinson and the girl.
The investigator wrote that other footage revealed Hutchinson questioning whether he could be prosecuted by Mexican authorities over the incident. Hutchinson was talking to then-OUR operative Matt Osborne by phone, who reassured him there was nothing to worry about and they didn’t need to show the video to the U.S. government.
“I’m just content this is not an issue,” Osborne said in the footage.
Hutchinson has denied the girl was underage and said the incident was part of an undercover operation.
“In regards to the undercover mission in Cabo San Lucas, 23 victims were liberated, and some very bad men are now in prison. Your reference to the trafficker testing our legitimacy is a non story. I have a sworn affidavit by the federal police saying she was over 18,” he told Vice News, but failed, after multiple requests, to provide them with the affidavit.
Osborne took over as president and chief operating officer of OUR when Ballard stepped down after facing his own sexual misconduct allegations.
Newsweek contacted OUR by email for comment, and also reached out to the film’s director Alejandro Monteverde, lead producer Eduardo Verástegui and distributor Angel Studios.
OUR clarified in a statement to Vice that Osborne had contacted Mexican federal police, who investigated the incident and decided not to press charges because they believed the woman was not a minor.
“The Mexican police investigated the incident and did not press charges as the woman was an adult. Mr. Hutchinson has never been employed by OUR in an official capacity and OUR ceased any affiliation with him shortly thereafter. The actions by Mr. Hutchinson do not represent OUR’s standard operating procedure and were inappropriate, regardless if the woman was an adult or not,” the statement read.
Hutchinson is not the first person associated with the film to face complaints of misconduct.
Ballard was accused of sexual misconduct involving seven women where he invited them to act as his “wife” during undercover overseas missions to rescue trafficking victims.
He allegedly sent a photo of himself in his underwear to one woman, asked another “how far she was willing to go,” and offered to shower with or sleep in bed with others under the guise of fooling traffickers that they were a real couple.
Ballard resigned from OUR on June 22, 2023, and an FBI investigation into the incidents was closed this year without any charges being brought. He apparently has now fallen out of favor with a prominent leader in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Mormon President M. Russell Ballard—no relation to Tim Ballard—believed the latter “betrayed their friendship, through the unauthorized use of President Ballard’s name for Tim Ballard’s personal advantage and activity regarded as morally unacceptable,” according to a report in Vice.