What are some of the crime rings who aren’t very good at crime?
Let’s get right into it!
6 - Rugby Big Brains 'Big Boss' Jonathan Boorman and ex-rugby player
Alexander Karonias targeted hundreds of British college students in a mobile phone scheme
worth 2 million pounds.
Karonias was a former rugby player for London Scottish, who had to retire after sustaining
a back injury.
Boorman, also known as the 'Big Boss', was the operation's leader.
The pair didn't act alone and had several accomplices, including Boorman's father, Michael
Boorman.
The group conned students into handing over their personal information that was used for
mobile phone contracts or unclaimed upgrades.
JBi Systems
Boorman and Karonias worked under the guise of JBi Systems Ltd, JBi Capital Ltd, and Netlink
Services UK ltd.
After getting the students' personal information to get phones, then they would sell the SIM
cards to spam marketers.
These spammers, would of course, send these students thousands of spam texts.
This crime ring then would use the students’ fake contracts to get even more phones on
a single contract.
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Basically, these scammers wanted as many new phones as possible.
For example, they would request upgrades for new phones but afterward claim they wanted
them with a different storage size or in another color.
Instead of sending back the latest iPhone or smartphone, they'd send back a cheap old
one.
The cell phone company then sent them new phones, enabling the conspirators to take
advantage of the system.
Busted
The group was caught by authorities when they found a document titled 'JBi Directory' at
the company's offices in 2014 during a raid.
A judge sentenced Boorman to six years and four months in prison and Karonias to five
years.
The rest of the group received prison sentences of around two years each.
Sounds like these phonies were forwarded…to jail.
5 - Definitely Not Car Insurance A crime ring in Manchester, England, used
fake bank cards to claim 95,000 pounds worth of car insurance rewards.
The key figures in the scam were three gang members, including Mohammed Shoaib, the brows-
umm brains … behind the operation.
The group used fake bank cards to purchase insurance and would request refunds shortly
afterward.
The money from those refunds would go into legitimate bank accounts of members of the
operation.
Their scheme made just under 100,000 pounds until it caught the attention of the insurance
company 1st Central.
Employees at the company saw huge refunds for two motor insurance policies that the
company paid into the bank account of Amjad Mughal, one of the scammers.
Internal Audit
1st Central conducted an internal inquiry that uncovered 32 motor insurance policies
purchased with fraudulent bank cards.
After the policies were purchased, the buyer would add additional cover for the policy
but use a different card from the one they used for the first purchase.
The second card belonged to a member of the operation.
A few days later, the person claiming to be the policyholder would cancel the policy for
a full refund sent to their legitimate bank card.
Greater Manchester police worked with the City of London's fraud department to catch
the fraudsters.
They quickly arrested four gang members, or roughly 5 eyebrows, and after conducting further
search warrants, nine more members handed themselves into police custody.
Police have arrested 13 people in connection to the operation for conspiracy to commit
fraud, with the highest sentence going to Mohammed Shoaib, who was sentenced to 21 months
in prison.
The rest of the group's prison sentences ranged from 16 to 2 months.
4 - Ghana Steal Fred Asante, a Ghanaian citizen, based in
the United States, played a crucial role in the Enterprise, a criminal operation that
conducted several fraudulent operations.
The Enterprise had several ways of getting money from its victims.
With the help of Asante, they ran a business scam where he set up legitimate-seeming companies.
Those companies were just a front to defraud American individuals and businesses to receive
and later launder millions of dollars.
The Enterprise applied for the Economic Injury Disaster Loan Program that the United States
Small Business Administration implemented to relieve businesses struggling during the
COVID-19 pandemic.
They put legitimate company names on the forms, but their paperwork was fraudulent.
Funds were deposited into bank accounts that the Enterprise controlled.
Perhaps the Enterprise's cruelest scheme was a romantic scam they created to prey upon
vulnerable, lonely people.
They sent emails, texts, and direct messages on dating websites, pretending to be people
looking for love on the Internet.
Victims believed they were talking to potential partners; some even found themselves in relationships.
The victims were often older men or women speaking to Enterprise members.
After establishing the relationship, the victims' alleged new partners convinced them to wire
money to their love interests, which then went directly into the bank accounts of members
of the Enterprise.
Laundering
Asante used 19 business bank accounts across at least ten different banks to launder victims'
money.
They used different company names, depending on which scam victims were paying into, and
once he received the money, he would launder the money to members of the Enterprise abroad.
Asante used the Enterprise's proceeds to buy cars, food, and other goods from U.S.-based
suppliers, then, he shipped the products to Ghana.
Like Robinhood, if Robinhood was from Ghana, stole from innocent people, and his merry
men were a band of scamming cyber criminals.
This process made it difficult to locate the origin of the proceeds and conceal the identity
of the beneficiaries of the scams.
Busted
Between 2016 and 2020, Asante handled $35 million, broken out across multiple business
accounts.
Overall the three scams laundered at least $50 million.
Asante was arrested in Virginia in February 2021 and pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit
money laundering.
The US Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York sentenced him to nine
years in prison for money laundering, three years of supervised release, and ordered him
to pay a forfeiture of roughly $650,000 and restitution of $2,300,000.
3 - Facebook Friendly A fraudster based in Atlanta was identified
through a Facebook selfie after she stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from multiple
banks.
Tanya Monique Peel visited bank after bank, where she withdrew thousands of dollars at
a time.
Police believed that she was a part of a sophisticated group of scammers, and she stole the identity
of at least one person, a Charles Schwab client named Terance Fowler.
Peel had Fowler's information, including his cell phone number, so she could verify the
transfer after Charles Schwab called Fowler to confirm the purchases.
She ensured that the victim's calls were forwarded to an untraceable cell phone so the fraudsters
could quickly tell the Charles Schwab representatives that they authorized the transfer.
Fake Accounts
Peel set up a phony business account in an Atlanta branch of JP Morgan Chase, where she
transferred $123,000 that she'd stolen through identity theft.
She moved another $52,000 to a Wells Fargo branch in California.
Immediately after the transfers, she withdrew all the money from the account.
However, Tanya wasn't as slick as she thought she was- she actually used her real name in
the account, making it easy for police to find her on Facebook.
Her selfies matched the images of the woman in the surveillance video.
Tanya Peel turned herself into authorities after Atlanta police identified her.
They charged her with felony theft by taking, and taking too many dumb selfies.
2 - Tax Return Fraud From 2015 to 2018, at least nine cybercriminals
banded together to conduct a sophisticated tax fraud scheme that cost companies millions
of dollars.
The group took to the dark web to buy computer server credentials for tax preparation and
certified public accounting firms.
Once they had the server credentials, they could access the tax returns of thousands
of clients from those CPA and tax firms.
The tax returns gave them access to clients' personal information, such as their full names,
social security numbers, dates of birth, and financial records.
The group then created and operated multiple fraudulent tax preparation businesses in south
Florida.
The companies filed false tax returns that the group then put into bank accounts or onto
debit cards that they controlled.
They made sure they covered their tracks by opening bank accounts in the names of their
fake businesses so that they would receive 'tax preparer fees' and even registered preparer
tax identification numbers with the IRS.
They ran at least six fake organizations.
To avoid drawing too much attention to themselves, the group used pseudonyms and opened business
entities and bank accounts in the conspirators' names.
They also had multiple different email addresses.
Once they had their victims' information, they used it to make it seem like the victims
were the ones filing the bulk false returns.
Monica Jenkins
One of the conspirators was Monica Jenkins, whose mother, Brenda Forman, was Broward County's
Clerk of the Court.
Alongside three other co-defendants, authorities arrested Jenkins and took her to Broward County
Jail.
Forman helped get her daughter out on bond and cosigned the personal surety bond for
her release.
Three out of Jenkins' eight co-defendants received bonds as well.
The conditions of Jenkins' release were that she had to wear a GPS monitor, couldn't work
or contact anyone else involved in the criminal operation, and had to live at her mother's
home.
So she was basically grounded and was no longer to hangout with her bad influence friends.
Monica also had to surrender her passport, submit a DNA sample, and participate in random
drug testing.
Three of her co-defendants received the same conditions.
RICO
The group's charges fall under RICO, an acronym for racketeer-influenced and corrupt organizations,
because they stole IRS-issued identification numbers of tax preparation and CPA firms that
they used to file false tax returns.
Richard Nixon signed RICO into law in 1970 and intended to use it when prosecuting the
Mafia and other organized crime groups.
The FBI and the IRS investigated the case and uncovered the details of the operation.
All the conspirators face RICO charges, which carry a 20-year federal prison sentence.
Four of the conspirators also face charges of aggravated identity theft and wire fraud
conspiracy.
Wire fraud conspiracy has a maximum penalty of 20 years, and, combined with the aggravated
identity theft charges, the four face two more years of imprisonment added to their
sentencing.
In total, the conspirators stole the information of 9,000 victims.
Over the four years, they claimed over $36 million in false tax refunds.
Their case is ongoing as of late November 2022.
And Monica’s mom said she has to do extra chores around the house in the meantime.
1 - Playing Monopoly A cash printing operation based in Kent, England,
conspired to supply over 12 million pounds in counterfeit bills, making it one of Britain's
most extensive fake cash-printing operations ever.
At least four people were actively involved in the operation when they caught the attention
of authorities and Andrew Ainsworth was the most prominent member in the group.
Officers raided a warehouse where the group operated and found stacks of fake 20 pound
notes worth 5.25 million pounds.
Not Park Ave
When police raided the industrial unit, they found Philip Brown standing in the middle
of a pile of counterfeit cash, with a look on his face typically reserved for when you're
sure you were just going to fart, but then you realize there was a little something extra.
The men used a printing press that would typically produce magazines or flyers, but it was a
way to quickly print large amounts of the fake bills.
After the initial bust, it seemed the crew were just trying to get rid of the rest of
the bills any way they could.
This led to a dog walker stumbling across five million pounds broken into 20 pound notes
tossed in some bushes, and another 200,000 pounds discovered along a railway line.
It was bad enough that they were counterfeiters, but litter bugs too?
Nice example, guys.
The Bank of England reported finding a new counterfeit 20 pound note in general circulation
in January 2019, the same time the investigation began.
1.6 million pounds worth of bills made it into circulation across the UK, making the
total amount of bills printed over 12 million pounds.
John Evans, Philip Brown, and Nick Winter were arrested by Kent police and admitted
to producing counterfeit currency at Woolwich Crown Court.
Their sentences ranged from ten to six years.
Go To Jail
Andrew Ainsworth avoided the initial arrests but, in April 2022, was sentenced to five
and a half years in prison.
He did not pass go, he did not collect $200.
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