Fake ID sentencing

08 June 2012

Mark Powell-Richards, 59 (date of birth 21/8/52), credit broker & antiques dealer of Nightingale Lane, Bickley, Kent was sentenced to 2 years 3 months for conspiracy to defraud, contrary to Common Law.

Allen Stringer, 57 (date of birth 24/7/54) of Coldwell Road, Crossgates, Leeds was sentenced to 2 years 3 months for conspiracy to defraud, contrary to Common Law.

Michael Daly, 68 (date of birth 08/10/43), former chauffer of Stone Court, High Street, Erith, Kent was sentenced to 12 months suspended for 2 years and 250 hours of unpaid community service for conspiracy to defraud, contrary to Common Law.

Jaipal Singh, 31 (date of birth 07/8/80), Director of telecoms company, of Franchise Street, Wednesbury, West Midlands was sentenced to 18 months for conspiracy to defraud, contrary to Common Law.

Arun Thear, 22 (date of birth 13/2/90) student, of Walsall Road, West Bromwich, West Midlands was sentenced to 6 mths suspended for 2 years and 150 hours unpaid community service for forgery, contrary to section 1 of the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981.

All six had pleaded guilty at earlier hearings.

The Crown Prosecution Service made a decision not to prosecute Barry Sales because he has a terminal illness.

Jason Place and Barry Sales ran operations from the comfort of their Spanish villas in Alicante whilst employees based at locations around the UK would monitor the website Confidential Access and work on producing various documents, including false bank statements, wage slips, driving licences and utility bills.

Documents were billed as novelty items for the purposes of impressing friends, however the police investigation which lasted some two and a half years revealed a well practised production line of very authentic documents for the purpose of committing fraud. Many were bundled together and sold as full credit profiles which included wage slips, credit history print outs and a postal address making it possible for the customers to defraud companies of thousands of pounds.

One of the top end products was called the Platinum Profile. This cost £5,500 and came complete with instructions on how to commit identity fraud. They also had a Profile called the 100% Creditmaster profile which was exclusive to VIP members of the website. This would usually cost £2000. However, if the customer successfully committed fraud with the Creditmaster profile, Confidential Access would ask for 50% of the customer's first fraud or threaten to wreck the credit profile.

Web chat forums were a key part of the fraud providing clients with information, advice and coaching them on how to use the profiles and commit fraud. Some of the forums were free but others came at a cost.

A monthly subscription fee bought members access to forums where they could discuss how to use the identity documents to commit fraud and seek other tips and advice. Access to the forums was graded and some were only open to those members who had spent a specific amount of money and had gained a specific level of trust. The top-tier member was classed as a VIP member and had access to a forum called "The Black Marketplace". This is where serious incriminating topics were discussed and hidden from the general public and non-VIP members.

Nautical terms were used to distinguish the varying levels of trust within the forums. All new paying members would begin as deckhands and as they gained trust would climb the rank ladder from Skylarker to Shore Patrol, up to the Ship's Surgeon who was in charge.

Painstaking analysis of servers which had been seized from Hong Kong led to a breakthrough by officers when they cracked the highly sophisticated encryption codes opening up a treasure trove of evidence.

Determined to continue Confidential Access responded by setting up servers in Holland which were also later seized for analysis by the MPS.

Of the 11,000 clients who used the company's services, some spent more than £20,000 on false documentation during the course of their business with the company. Some clients went on to commit fraud of their own which in some cases totalled more than £1 million.

DI Tim Dowdeswell said: "This was a sophisticated operation which has netted millions of pounds over the years. These cyber criminals not only provided the tools to commit fraud they instructed their clients in how to use them to make the maximum amount of money, whilst ruining real people's credit histories into the bargain.

"We have already brought many of their students in crime to court and will continue to work with other police forces and partners to bring those people who bought and used these identities in their own frauds to justice."