SHAUN Davidson is Australia’s most notorious jailbreaker — the Ned Kelly of our times.

One of four foreign prisoners who made a risky dash for freedom by burrowing a tunnel 15m under the walls of Bali’s infamous Kerobokan’s prison in June — Davidson has remained several steps ahead of a global manhunt to rearrest him for more than two months now.

He’s also become a social media sensation thanks to a series of Facebook posts in which he taunts his would-be captors with comments like “Run run as fast as you can can’t catch me I’m the gingerbread man” and mock-up wanted and movie posters.

On Saturday Davidson reached Facebook’s limit of 5,000 friends, including a bevy of beautiful women who leave regular comments like “Stay safe”, “Love your work, Shaun” and “OMG is this that guy?”

Now Davidson hopes to become Australia’s richest jailbreaker too, demanding a whopping $4.4 million for an exclusive phone interview and a few photos taken from his alleged hide-out in the Caribbean island of Barbados — a deal the fugitive from Perth has described as “the holy grail of journalism”.

CASHING IN ON CRIME

Davidson has been trying to capitalise on his infamy since late July when he notified the media via Facebook of a tender or silent auction for his first interview since he broke out of Kerobokan. “If there is an offer I like or [it] is close I will email you back with conditions or counter offer,” the post reads.

Last week, Davidson told this reporter he’d received an offer of $50,000 for a short interview and $20,000 for one photo. “I laughed at them [because] that’s nowhere near what it’s worth,” he wrote. “I’m happy to sit tight without an interview. If [you do] not want to that’s fine. You’re not the only reporter wanting thus holy grail of media at the moment.”

And then yesterday he sent me the mother of all Facebook messages.

Davidson refused to identify the media organisations that made the alleged offers of $20,000 and $50,000. However, when asked how much he expected to earn for a comprehensive tell-all interview, Davidson acknowledged he is “not allowed to profit” from a cash-for-comment deal under tough proceeds of crime legislation — a patchwork of state and federal laws that prevent Australian citizens and residents from profiteering off crimes committed here or abroad.

To get around the laws, Davidson is connecting interested parties with his sister Charmajne Pattison or a person pretending to be Pattison who has access to what appears to be the Perth mother’s legitimate Facebook page.

“Hi, I’m Shaun’s sister,” read the first message sent to this reporter from Pattison’s alleged Facebook account ... What kind of interview were you after? A full exclusive or just a quick one I need to know so I can give you a quote.”

The Facebook page then instructed this reporter to download Wickr, a secure smartphone app launched by security experts in 2012. Wickr is similar to Snapchat in that messages are deleted seconds after being viewed by the receiver, making it popular among people being unfaithful to their partners.

Yet nothing prevents the receiver from taking photos of Wickr messages, as per the following screenshots of a conversation that took place this weekend between this reporter and Flickerbelle — Pattison’s alleged Wickr account.

FACE VALUE

Is a phone interview with Davidson and “a couple of worthwhile pics” really worth AUD $4.4 million? Not according to Max Markson, Australia’s best-known celebrity manager.

“It’s a good story and worth doing an interview for a domestic media organisation,” Markson said. “But it’s not a global or worldwide story like that of Oscar Pistorius, whose interview was worth $1.25 million.

“Having said that, once the initial story is done, there is scope for a book deal if and when Shaun wanted to do that. But even that is not going to get him a million dollars or anywhere near it in my opinion. Good luck to him though. If he is legit and is able to write well he could almost be a James Bond or Jason Bourne character … maybe he should call John Grisham and do a deal on future earnings.”

But Davidson doesn’t have a hope of getting a multimillion-dollar interview deal for a phone interview and a few photographs, Markson said. “Maybe he could get $100,000 from local TV for a video interview,” Markson said.

“60 Minutes or Sunday Night could find a way to do a deal if they wanted to get the story. But he won’t even get 1 per cent of what he’s asking from a magazine or newspaper because they don’t have that kind of money anymore. The only magazine in Australia that may be interested in doing a deal is Penthouse Australia because female readers are not that interested in this kind of story.”

Damien Costas, the publisher of Penthouse Australia, described Davidson’s asking price of $4.4 million as “lunatic”.

“It’s a great story but he’s not going to get that much, certainly not from me,” Costas said. “I would consider paying him 1 per cent to get an exclusive like that but my preference would be to send a journalist to his hide-out with a video crew because it’s a far more effective medium.”

Flickerbelle, however, rejected Costas’ hypothetical offer. “Shaun would rather not do an interview [at that price], and he will just release the story through his diaries to a writer and get it published and follow up with a doco [sic] or mini series or even a movie,” she wrote.

PROCEEDS OF CRIME

Even if Flickerbelle is successful in securing a cash-for-comment deal with the media or a film studio, will his sister or any person in Australia claiming to be his sister be allowed to profit from Davidson’s crimes?

George Newhouse, a Sydney-based lawyer, said it was not entirely out of the question. He based his answer on the case of David Hicks, the Australian who was detained by the US Government at Guantánamo Bay detention camp from 2001 until 2007 and whose autobiography, Guantanamo: My Journey, was published by Random House in 2010.

“In David Hicks’ case, the Australian Government was not successful in recovering the proceeds of his book because he never admitted that he committed an offence under his plea deal,” Newhouse explained. “But this is quite a different situation because Mr Davidson has escaped from jail in Indonesia and if he ever returns to Australia he may well have to hand over the financial proceeds of any media interviews.”

But Glenn Porter, an associate professor of criminology at the University of New England, said there was no chance Davidson or anyone else in Australia would be allowed to keep a hypothetical cash payment from the media, a book publisher or film studio.

“It’s an interesting question as to whether a family member or third party can profit from the proceeds of another person’s crimes,” Porter said. “But if you look at Schapelle Corby’s case, her people thought they could do a similar thing and they received legal advice against it.

“So my perception is that the Australian Government would retrieve any payment made to another person on Shaun’s behalf,” he said. “It would be a highly politicised scandal and the government would put pressure on the Australian Federal Police to pursue it as a matter of principle. They would not let them get away with it, even if he does his time.

“It’s the same reason Schapelle Corby has not cashed in on her ordeal, Porter explained. “She has been told by the authorities that if she sells her story, they will pursue her. So there’s very little chance that a thing as big as this would be ignored.”

News.com.au did not pay Shaun Davidson or his alleged sister anything, nor did it ever intend to.