Reports of frauds, deceptions and scams keep appearing, weekly even daily, on
major news channels and newspapers. Some of these frauds seem just too big and remote to be of immediate, direct relevance to our daily lives. But, we will eventually pay for the consequences and damages, in taxes, costs of goods and services, regulations, copy-cats etc.

I hope we can collect, in one thread, frauds and scams, reported or heard. We must become more aware and more educated to guard against frauds and scams
which impact upon the health, well being, and wealth of ourselves and our families.

Thomas C. Durant

"Dr. Thomas Clark Durant, 18201885, was an American financier and railroad promoter. He was vice-president of the Union Pacific in 1869 when it met the Central Pacific railroad at Promontory Summit in Utah Territory. He was also a chief architect of what would become the Crit Mobilier scandal."

...

"Durant had a ruthless reputation for squeezing friend and foe for personal gain. The Pacific Railroad Act authorizing the government subsidies for building the railroad required that the Union Pacific not have concentrated ownership. Durant got around the restriction by persuading cohorts that if they put their names on the stock he would make the initial payment for the stock. Then he enforced his ownership and controlled almost half the Union Pacific stock.

At the same time Durant manipulated the stock market running up the value of his M&M stock by saying he was going to connect the Transcontinental Railroad to it while at the same time secretly buying competing rail line stock and then saying the Transcontinental Railroad was going to go to that line.

Since the government paid for each mile of track laid, Durant overrode his engineers and ordered extraneous track to be built in large oxbows so that in the first 2 1/2 years the Union Pacific did not go further than 40 miles from Omaha. Durant did not have to worry about government oversight because it was preoccupied with the Civil War. When the war ended in 1865 the Union Pacific made a mad dash and was to complete nearly two thirds of the transcontinental route."

"One of biggest coups was Credit Mobilier. The company was one of the first to take advantage of the new limited liability financial structures. Previously investors were responsible for the finances of a company if it had problems. Under limited liability the only responsibility was for money paid in. Credit Mobilier was created to actually build the track. Durant manipulated its structure so that he wound up in control of it and thus his own company Union Pacific was paying him via Credit Mobilier to build the railroad."

"Durant was to attempt to cover his tracks by having various politicians including future President James Garfield as limited stockholders."

...

People & Events: Thomas Clark Durant (1820-1885)

...

"Slippery Exit
The Doctor remained ever slippery. After the lines joined at Promontory Summit, Utah, Oliver and Oakes Ames prepared to oust Durant once and for all. Durant beat them to the punch, however, resigning his position, moving onto new railroad projects and new fields of plunder."

Food officials are investigating an alleged eggs mislabelling scam.

"As many as 500 million battery farmed eggs may have been sold at premium or free range prices over the last five years as part of the alleged con.

Government officials said the fraud may be ten times bigger than first thought when it emerged four months ago.

Enforcement officers are trying to unravel a complex supply network to find out who masterminded the operation.

..."

Another example why must less trust and more cynicisms are necessary and a good thing in our society ...

UK duo accused of insider trading

"US stock market regulators have accused a British couple of insider trading relating to the $45bn (22.9bn) takeover of energy firm TXU.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) allege that UK residents Sunil and Seema Sehgal made $270,000 by illegal trading in TXU shares.

A US court has frozen the duo's assets and the SEC is seeking the return of the money and financial penalties.

The TXU deal was the largest private equity purchase in corporate history.

The Sehgals are the first people to be publicly identified as part of the SEC's case against alleged insider trading before the TXU deal.

The SEC alleges the Sehgals made "highly profitable and suspicious purchases" of options for TXU stock before its announcement on 26 February that it had agreed to be bought by a consortium including Texas Pacific and Goldman Sachs.

They did this, it is alleged, after being in possession of significant information about the transaction which was not available to the public.

..."

Wish FSA can be a much as 1/10th as effective as the SEC which probably only catches a tiny fraction of financial frauds and insider tradings ...

Travel agent jailed in 500m scam

"A travel agent has become the 11th person to be jailed in connection with a money laundering scam worth 500m.

Bradford Travel Centre owner Shahid Nazir Bhatti, 45, of Shipley Fields, admitted taking part in the fraud.

Bhatti was jailed for three years in the last of a series of court cases that could not be reported until restrictions were lifted on Tuesday.

He was the 11th person to be convicted for the scam, uncovered by revenue officers across West Yorkshire in 2001.

HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) officials targeted a number of travel agents in the county they suspected had been using the "hawala" system of transferring cash abroad.

Illegal money

Hawala exchanges are an ancient form of money exchange, used in Asian countries, which bypass the ordinary financial regulatory system.

Investigators were alerted to the activities when financial institutions realised the scale of some of the transactions.

They carried out a series of raids in February 2001.

The fraud centred around travel agencies, including Bhatti's, which alone was believed to have been used to launder more than 42m of illegal money.

Also involved in the operation were Watan Travel, with branches in Bradford and Birmingham, and Ramzan Travel, based in Halifax.

A HRMC spokesman said that couriers working for criminal gangs would collect money from drug traffickers and dealers around the UK and would deliver it to other premises in Leeds for counting and sorting.

David Odd, HMRC head of investigation for Yorkshire, said: "Literally hundreds of thousands of pounds in 'dirty cash' was being ferried up the M1 on an almost daily basis.

"The money was then deposited into business and personal accounts at various banking outlets, converted into foreign currencies, then transferred to accounts in the United States, the United Arab Emirates and across Europe."

The judicial process was extended after several defendants took their cases to appeal at higher courts, leading to retrials.

Defendants jailed

Bhatti was originally jailed for 10 years. His conviction was then quashed on appeal and he was jailed for three years at Bradford Crown Court on Tuesday on his second conviction.

The others convicted of the fraud were:

*
Amer Ramzan, of Heath Lea, Halifax. Owner of Ramzan Travel. Initially jailed for 12 years. This conviction was quashed on appeal and he was later jailed for nine years on a second conviction.

*
Faisal Malik, of Thirlmere Close, Leeds. Jailed for 10 years.

*
Imran Syed, of Thirlmere Close, Leeds. Jailed for four years.

*
Shahel Gazi, of Cubitt Street, Kings Cross, London. Jailed for two-and-a-half years.

*
James Carr, of Halkyn Drive, Liverpool. Jailed for 10 years.

*
Claire O'Brien, of Heywood Rd, Manchester. Jailed for two-and-a-half years.

*
George William Cockerill, now deceased, of Tolmers Road, Cuffley, Potters Bar, Hertfordshire. Jailed for three years.

*
Liaquat Ali, 44, of Woodlands Road, Sparkhill, Birmingham. Jailed for 12 years. This conviction was quashed on appeal but he was later jailed for 12 years after a second conviction.

*
Akhtar Hussain, 46, of Skipton Road, Keighley. Jailed for 12 years. This conviction was quashed on appeal but he was later jailed for 12 years on a second conviction.

*
Mohsan Khan, 48, of Lance Way, High Wycombe. Jailed for eight years. This conviction was quashed on appeal but he was later jailed for five years on a second conviction."

Motorists hit by card clone scam

"Thousands of motorists who use a bank card to buy petrol are thought to have lost millions of pounds in a scam allegedly linked to Tamil rebels.

It is believed cards are being skimmed at petrol stations, whereby the card details and pin numbers are retrieved and money withdrawn from the account.

About 200 of the UK's 9,500 petrol stations are thought to have been hit.

The Sri Lankan government has claimed its opponents, the Tamil Tigers, are behind the scam.

Police are investigating complaints made in Edinburgh, Norwich, Bury St Edmunds, Peterborough, Nottingham, Leeds, Bristol and Hull.

...

Most of the UK's petrol stations are independently run which means they are susceptible to being infiltrated by organised crime.

...

The petrol industry accepts it is a problem.

..."

Viewers 'lose millions' to GMTV

"Callers to premium-rate phone competitions on the GMTV breakfast show have been defrauded out of millions of pounds, a BBC investigation has found.

Panorama found a company working for GMTV had been finalising shortlists of potential winners "long before" phone lines closed, for the past four years. "

GMTV has moved to suspend all phone-ins, but said it was confident it had not breached regulators' codes.

The phone operator, Opera Interactive Technology, denied any wrongdoing."

...

Panorama also alleged Opera sales director Mark Nuttall had discovered what was going on in 2003 and sent an e-mail to staff telling them to keep it secret from GMTV.

But Opera has denied any wrongdoing.
..."


Panorama: TV's Dirty Secrets can be seen on BBC One at 2030 BST on Monday 23 April


If true, then WHO in Opera Interactive Technology is/are responsible ???
Are past "winners" genuine callers ?

It reminded me of the cruise-ship episode in last year's Apprentice.

What I find odd is that Who Wants to be a Millionaire is escaping from all this challenge to the use of premium phone lines.

I read that most of its income does not come from selling the prog to the BBC, but from the charge made to callers, on premium lines, phoning and asking to be chosen to compete. I am sure they are never warned about what these calls cost.

Of course there is a problem with the celebrity shareholders like Tarrant having made mega-bucks from selling out their interests in the company that makes the prog. Maybe I should say a problem for the celebs and maybe this is why, what I think is a scandal, has never hit the headlines.

TP

Interesting sentence!

------

George William Cockerill, now deceased, of Tolmers Road, Cuffley, Potters Bar, Hertfordshire. Jailed for three years.

I guess he's going to rot in jail !

Wouldn't like to be his cell mate :-)

Ex-Morgan Stanley Employee Pleads Guilty To Securities Fraud

"NEW YORK (AP)--A married couple, both lawyers, pleaded guilty to conspiracy and securities fraud Thursday in what was described as one of the biggest insider-trading cases in the U.S. since the 1980s, a $15 million scam that reached into some of the nation's top financial firms."

"U.S. Attorney Michael Garcia said at a news conferencing announcing the case that Wall Street professionals repeatedly traded on secrets revealed to them by insiders at UBS and Morgan Stanley."


Here in the UK in March this year, the FSA reported...

"nsider trading on the London stock market remains as common as it was in 2000, according to the City watchdog.

The Financial Services Authority (FSA) said 23.7% of takeover announcements in 2005 were preceded by suspicious share price movements.

The figure is little changed from 24% in 2000, although it has fallen from a peak of 32.4% in 2004.

The FSA and the Takeover Panel launched a study last December into why news about four big bids had been leaked.

'Particular concern'

The figure in 2000 is significant because that shows how bad the problem was before the implementation of the Financial Services and Markets Act.

There was better news on the level of suspicious activity ahead of results announcements.

Only 2% of significant announcements were preceded by informed activity in 2004/5, compared with 11.1% in 2002/3."

SEC Sues Pakistani Banker Rahim in TXU Trading Case

"By Otis Bilodeau

May 11 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission sued Pakistani investment banker Ajaz Rahim, making him the fifth person the agency has accused of illegal insider trading in TXU Corp. securities.

Rahim was head of investment banking for Faysal Bank Ltd. in Karachi, Pakistan, when Credit Suisse Group banker Hafiz Naseem fed him advance tips on a $32 billion buyout bid for TXU and eight other deals, the SEC said today in a lawsuit in Chicago federal court. Credit Suisse was an adviser on all nine deals, the agency said.

...

In March, the SEC sued Sunil and Seema Sehgal, a couple living in the U.K., for illegally trading on advance information about the TXU buyout. The agency amended that complaint on May 3 to include Naseem and Francisco Javier Garcia, who the SEC said may live in Switzerland. The regulator accused Garcia of buying TXU options less than a week before the bid became public."

In our age of global communications and markets, the frauds have also become interntaional. In this case, USA, Pakistan, UK, Switzerland ...

Neither frauds nor scams, until test case is heard ...

Park the news here for future reference.

Judge warns 'unreasonable' banks

"A High Court judge has warned banks to stop behaving unreasonably when customers accuse them of levying unlawful overdraft charges.

Judge David Mackie QC issued the warning at the London Mercantile Court, in the Royal Courts of Justice.

He said some banks were wasting the time of claimants and the courts by pretending they would defend claims when they had no intention of doing so.

He added if banks continued to do this he might award damages against them.
...

Judge Mackie pointed out that in some cases bank customers had tried to claim damages for stress and inconvenience.

Such claims have been unsuccessful so far, but he warned he would award damages in future if banks and their lawyers continued to:

* fail to respond to some claimants letters

* fail to negotiate for months and until a hearing date is set

* demand extra information from the claimants, knowing they had no intention letting a court hear the matter

* settle the case without telling the claimants they need not attend court

* fail to show up in court

..."

Doctors' online system scrapped

"The Department of Health is scrapping its controversial online application process for junior doctors.

The application process, MTAS (the Medical Training Application Service), will now only be used for monitoring, and not matching candidates to posts.

MTAS was taken off-line after Channel 4 News revealed that security breaches had made applicants' personal details openly available on the internet.

Today the government announced that a security review of the system has been handed to the police as criminal offences may have been committed.

..."

Who build the system? Deliberate security weakness and fraws? Insider job?

Online visa security flaw

"Exclusive: a security flaw in internet visa applications to the British High Commission in India means the details of 50,000 people may have been available online."

...

"Four hundred and seventy thousand Indians applied for visas to come to Britain last year. Not all applied online - but nearly 50,000 did, including Sanjib Mitra from Bangalore.

In April last year he had trouble with his application and in trying to sort things out discovered he could access all the other applications that had been made online.

Visa processing in India has been contracted out by the Foreign Office to a private Indian company, VFS Global.

In a blog last week Sanjib Mitra revealed how he had checked and found the loophole was still there. He says he emailed the company last year - and heard nothing. And he emailed the British High Commission, who two months later replied that they would look into it.

Concerned, he alerted an internet journalist specialising in computer security.

Indian online visa applications have now been suspended. And we can reveal the security breach is widening - online applications from Russia and Nigeria, run by the same company, have been suspended too.

The Foreign Office, which in February awarded VFS a five year contract worth 190 million for visa processing, told us -

"This VFS system is used only to record the details of visa applicants applying online through VFS, and to allow those applicants to see how long it will take to have their passport returned. It is not connected to the secure UK government information system used to process the applications."

And because data privacy may have been compromised, the Information Commissioner is to investigate.

No-one knows if anyone has stolen the personal data that was so freely available.

VFS told us they were working hard to secure their systems - they process visa applications for entry to 14 countries, but the UK is their biggest customer.

It is the sheer scale of this security that is staggering: it dwarfs the MTAS computer scandal.

The online system has been running since 2003 and is known to have been compromised for at least a year with tens of thousands of personal details up for grabs."

I am sure there are UK IT professionals who would have done better job at a 10th of the price (19M) ... the Treasury will get some too via taxes, the local community get a few more people employed etc ...

I have been receiving quite a few scam emails from so called Hang Seng bank employees and The dead foreigner scam from Africa. Found this site quite useful

http://www.joewein.de/sw/419scam.htm

Just had an e-mail from Nationwide to tell me Abbey have noticed 'unusual activity in my account'.

They say, 'For your security, We placed extra verification on your Abbey Online Access until this issue has been resolved please log in your account by clicking on the link bellow: Once you log in your account details, You will be automatically Redirected to our online Legal Releases.'

Doesn't the bad grammar give them away? Well, that and the fact I don't have accounts with either Nationwide or Abbey!

I'm sure though, that some punters are falling for this crap.

Sad or wot? Sad.

Had one myself from Alliance & Leicester who I do have an online account with, but again, poor grammar and poor spelling, but otherwise it was pretty convincing. Took me all of 5 seconds to realise it was fraudulent.

Doc, why not complete with rubbish, preferably a worm as an attachment!

Shoplifter With A Millionaire Lifestyle
Updated: 13:43, Saturday October 13, 2007



A shoplifter who lives a millionaire lifestyle, wearing designer clothes and staying at the best hotels, is being hunted by detectives.

Wanted: Kevin CastleKevin Castle makes up to 1,000 a day and police say he is Britain's biggest shoplifter.

The 42-year-old is wanted by three police forces - Lancashire, Greater Manchester and Nottinghamshire - in connection with offences that include shoplifting, identity theft, interception of mail and money laundering.

Castle is described as white and 5'5" tall. However, he often wears blocks in his shoes to make him look around 2" taller.

He has mousey brown receding hair and always wears expensive designer clothes such as Armani, Luis Vuitton and Versace.

Police say he is known to frequent high-class establishments in London such as the Ritz, Claridges and the Dorchester Hotel.

It is believed that Castle is currently living in London in rented accommodation (possibly costing at least 1,000 per week).

Castle often uses hire cars and tends to favour large vehicles such as the Porsche Cayenne, VW Touraeg and Jaguars.

Detective Constable Anita Fishwick, of Lancashire police, said: "Mr Castle is quite distinctive because of his clothing and his millionaire-type lifestyle.

"We believe he may also be purporting to be an electrical engineer, alarm fitter and property developer.

"He has alleged himself to be the director of a business called '1st Global Enterprises' and acquired hire vehicles and services under this guise. Most of which has remained unpaid.

Castle oftern targets DIY stores and returns the stolen items with with forged till receipts.

He is featured on Lancashire Constabulary's Most Wanted website.