Case Histories

Mr B

Mr B was looking forward to a relaxing wine-tasting holiday in South Africa, but thanks to a tip-off from the FBI, he was seized on arrival by airport police and thrown into a cell as one of America's most wanted criminals.

There the pensioner remained for more than a fortnight, while his family protested loudly that there had been a terrible mistake.

The FBI stood by the arrest and said they believed they had the right man. Their Mr B was a fugitive from justice who was wanted for a $5 million telemarketing fraud. They knew their suspect had used several identities in the past, including Mr B and Mr S. He was known to have travelled using a British passport. What's more, the captured Mr B had the same date of birth as the suspect and even physically resembled him.

The FBI eventually realised they had the wrong man after receiving an anonymous tip-off about where Mr S really was - hiding in Las Vegas under the name Mr G. FBI Agents were quick to arrest the real Mr G, and he soon admitted that HE was the right man. After realising they had two people in custody on the same charges, the US authorities knew the Mr B in South Africa couldn't possibly be the right man.

The FBI blamed identity fraud as the reason why the innocent Mr B had been detained.

The suspect had assumed the identity of the real Mr. B by using his date of birth, family history and passport number. He even managed to bear a resemblance to Mr B on his passport photo. The real Mr B's identity had been so thoroughly compromised that it took two weeks and the arrest of the 'real' fraudster before the mistake was realised.

The South African Police Service said most of the details of the Mr B they arrested matched those listed by the FBI on Interpol.

The US authorities explained their mistake: "This is a case of identity theft. As far back as 1989, the person arrested in America was using the name and identity of the British Mr B. It is very frequent crime, and in a sense, it is out of control and obviously in this case it has caused one person an awful lot of harm. He deserves an apology and he certainly gets one from me. I do apologise and others, I'm sure, will as well."

East London Identity Fraud Gang

After a seven-week trial at Chelmsford Crown Court, three defendants and two accomplices who had plundered the identities of the living and the dead were found guilty of conspiracy to defraud.

The gang had forged driving licences, pay slips, and utility bills to steal the identities of real people who had previously lived in properties that were now vacant and up for sale.

Operating from Colchester, Haverhill in Suffolk and East London, the gang stole the identities of 60 people across the country and used them to take out bank loans, overdrafts and credit cards.

Typical identity fraud cases such as this require enormous amounts of police resources to investigate, and the crime often crosses police authority boundaries making it more difficult to coordinate the investigation. It can therefore be difficult to detect and time-consuming to unravel. However, Suffolk and Essex Police worked together on this case, with between two and five officers working full time. Sixty innocent people needed to be interviewed, along with more than 100 bank accounts to be investigated.

The fraudsters had been successful up to their arrest. The ringleader drove a £160k sports car and owned a number of Rolex watches, one of which was allegedly worth £30k. The gang first thought the police were investigating them for minor cases of cheque fraud, and during the year-long investigation attempted to bribe police officers, claiming they "could make a lot of money from doing what they did".

The gang were sentenced in April 2003. The 32 year-old ringleader from Essex was sentenced to eight years, whilst two others were jailed for 5 and 4 years respectively. The Judge described the crimes as "complex and sophisticated".

Mr D and Unsolicited Mail

Mr D from Staffordshire's problems began after he received an unexpected letter in the morning post.

The letter was from a firm of solicitors in London advising him he was a beneficiary to some bearer bonds. The solicitors asked for his mother's maiden name and his date of birth, which Mr D willingly gave.

Mr D heard nothing more for months until he received a letter from a company referring to a credit card application he'd made. Mr D knew nothing about this application, and soon enough, more letters arrived from other lenders who suspected someone was trying to get credit in his name.

The impersonator of Mr D had tried to get into his bank account and even managed to gain access to his existing credit card accounts, netting around £20k.

Further checks showed that the solicitors who had first contacted Mr D did not exist. Their contact details were false - the phone number diverted to a mobile phone, which was never switched on, and the address on the letter was for a rented mailbox.

After leaving a trail of deception, the fraudsters disappeared without trace.

Mr H Moving House

Mr H's problems started a year after he moved house.

During the move, Mr H and his fiancée did all the right things - moved off the electoral register at their old address and on at the new one, informed their banks and utility companies of the move, and redirected their mail to the new address.

A year later, the couple applied for a credit card, but were refused. They knew they had a good credit record and decided to make further enquiries. The credit card company informed them that, according to their records, they already had one of their credit cards with an outstanding balance of £2,500.

The new occupiers of Mr H's previous address had applied for a credit card in his name six months after he had moved out. The fraudsters had even registered Mr H back onto the electoral register at his old address.

A total of 25 fraudulent applications in Mr H's name were made by the new occupiers, but only a handful were successful because they did not know his full personal details. However, they did manage to set up a computer company in Mr H's fiancée's name and managed to run up a sizeable debt with a utility company.

The couple managed to sort out the mess, and registered with the CIFAS Protective Registration service to help protect their identities from further misuse.

The David England Scam

Detected by CIFAS Members in 1998, this fraud scam also involved £1m of the credit industry's cash but as a result of prompt action from CIFAS Members the police recovered nearly half, caught the culprit, prosecuted and he received a 5 year prison sentence. The scam was well thought out, planned years in advance and executed almost perfectly. But for one CIFAS Member he would have got away with it. This particular Member noticed all the credits to their account came from one bank and all the debits went to another bank. This was very suspicious so they asked other Members to check if they had any suspicious accounts at the addresses concerned. There were so many responses, the police were immediately asked to intervene and David England was arrested as he was about to leave the UK.

The Slough Ring

Uncovered in the early 90s by CIFAS Members, this was one of the largest frauds to hit the UK consumer credit industry. A group of Pakistanis set up a limited company based in Slough. They even managed to open a Visa/MasterCard retailer facility with a High Street bank. They applied for and obtained a total of just over £1m of credit from virtually every credit supplier in the UK.

The scam was very elaborate and we cannot tell you exactly how it was done in case of copy-cat cases but it was virtually risk free. One CIFAS Member became suspicious when their systems identified a series of links emerging between employer details and the home addresses. The CIFAS warning they filed on the system brought responses from lenders all over the UK and within days it was clear the scam involved £0.5m or more. Just as CIFAS involved the police, the group disappeared overseas and was never caught. The UK consumer credit industry wrote off over £1m. But for CIFAS, the figure could have been many times more.