What is Lisa Noelle Voldeng’s reporting history and other investigative work prior to publishing the Sasha Riley tapes?
Executive summary
Lisa Noelle Voldeng is a Canadian Substack writer best known before the Sasha Riley episode for the newsletter “Outlaws of Chivalry,” and she published unverified audio of Sasha (Sascha) Riley that she says was recorded in July 2025; mainstream outlets and independent observers stress the recordings and many of Voldeng’s claims remain unverified [1] [2] [3]. Reporting about her prior work mostly points to her Substack persona and self-descriptions rather than a track record at established news organizations, and available coverage shows critics and supporters disagree sharply over the ethics and evidentiary basis of releasing raw testimony [1] [4] [5].
1. Who she presents herself as and where she publishes
Voldeng is identified in multiple accounts as the Canadian creator of a Substack newsletter called Outlaws of Chivalry, with a listed location on her site as Vancouver Island, and her Substack bio uses florid language claiming her work “spans every sweep of civilization, and beyond,” which is how most profiles characterize her public credentials prior to the Riley release [1] [4] [6].
2. The investigative act that brought her into the spotlight
Her most consequential work to date, as recorded in the coverage, is publishing a series of unedited audio recordings she says are interviews with Sasha Riley, which she reports were conducted by phone between July 19 and July 24, 2025; those recordings, and her account that she selectively contacted “allies, church, police, and government officials in various countries” after first speaking with Riley, are the nucleus of the viral reporting attributed to her [2] [4] [6].
3. Claims she has made about follow‑up and official contact
Voldeng has publicly stated on Substack that the FBI contacted Riley in the summer of 2025 and that Riley was subsequently moved out of the United States “to safety,” assertions repeated in secondary reporting but presented as her claims rather than independently verified facts [3] [4] [6].
4. Evidence, verification and how other reporters describe her methods
Mainstream and independent reporting consistently flags that the Riley tapes and supporting assertions remain unverified; outlets covering Voldeng’s publication stress there is no independent corroboration of the audio or of documentary proof offered with the posts, and some observers note the posts lack supporting documents such as emails or records that would normally accompany an investigative release [3] [1] [7] [5].
5. Reception: public advocates, skeptics and concerns about motive
Responses to Voldeng’s publication split between those who say releasing the raw testimony was a public service and those who warn the material—without corroborating documents—can be manipulated or misconstrued; commentators such as Charlotte Clymer praised the testimony’s power while also warning journalists about conflating belief in survivors with publication standards, a tension reflected across the coverage [5].
6. What is known about her prior investigative work — and what is not known
Available reporting prior to the Riley tapes ties Voldeng primarily to her Substack and the persona she projects there; none of the sources reviewed documents a prior longform investigative beat at mainstream outlets, serial investigative projects, or a history of corroborated exposés, and the open-source record in these accounts does not establish a conventional professional journalism resume beyond the Substack work [1] [4]. If more extensive investigative credits exist, the articles in the dataset do not cite them, and therefore this review cannot confirm their existence.
7. Implicit agendas and cautionary context
Coverage implicitly frames Voldeng as an independent actor operating outside institutional newsrooms, which confers both independence and the responsibility to supply verifiable evidence when making explosive allegations; some outlets and social commentators point out that publishing raw testimony can serve multiple agendas—whistleblowing, advocacy, or amplification of partisan narratives—and that readers and reporters should separate the existence of testimony from proof of allegations [3] [5].