fraud

Some people should have their computers confiscated, they are simply too stupid to have them:

A Christchurch woman was conned out of almost $27,000 trying to get a fake Christmas present out of Malaysian customs.

The case follows that of a Christchurch woman who lost $23,000 in a similar scam last month.

Police say they are mostly powerless to deal with online frauds as the money is sent overseas and out of their jurisdiction.

The latest victim, a 38-year-old woman, said she was contacted by a man online last year before she handed over the cash.

She had exchanged emails, instant messages and occasional phone calls with the man she had met through Yahoo’s internet dating service last April.

“Last December, he told me that he was coming over from the UK, where he claimed to live,” said the woman, who did not want to be named.

“He also told me that he’d sent me a Christmas present. A few days after that, he told me that the present was being held by customs in Malaysia, pending payment of duty.”

She was told the package contained iPhones, iPads, lingerie, jewellery and a large sum of money.

The conman then claimed to be stuck working on an oil rig off the coast of Venezuela, and he asked her to take care of the customs problem.

“Over the following six to eight weeks, he managed to get almost $27,000 out of me and this ‘present’ never arrived.”

The woman said she was embarrassed.

An iPhone, iPad, some knickers and jewelry??? …she could have bought all of that with the amount she paid…and had a holiday in Malaysia.

Some people are beneath contempt:

A Nelson woman has been jailed for two years and three months for fleecing a vulnerable woman with Alzheimer’s of $28,452.

Brenda Schwass-Arnold was yesterday sentenced in the Nelson District Court after pleading guilty to 203 charges of using the woman’s bank card to clean out her accounts.

The woman Joyce Cherry, had Alzheimer’s, was unable to communicate and had impaired comprehension when Schwass-Arnold, who was in a relationship with her son Neill Cherry, took the money. Police withdrew a further 100 charges last year after Schwass-Arnold entered guilty pleas last year.

Schwass-Arnold started looking after Mrs Cherry and became familiar with her bank account details and passwords. In July 2010 she started taking money out of the savings account she initially withdrew money at ATMs in Motueka, but also in Havelock, Picton, Blenheim, Nelson, Richmond and Stoke.

Schwass-Arnold has a history of defrauding vulnerable people.

Two Dragon’s Den investors were tucked by a conman, who has now been sentenced to jail:

A Dragons’ Den conman who blew £230,000 invested by Peter Jones and Theo Paphitis on himself instead of his ‘satnav for skiers’ was jailed for two years and eight months today.

Jean-Claude Baumgartner, 50, duped the Dragon’s into handing over the cash with false promises of a successful business backed up by fake emails and letters.

Judge Aidan Marron QC, sitting at Blackfriars Crown Court, said: “The fact remains that you have been responsible for persistent dishonesty. You may well in fact have intended to operate a legitimate business but the means that you chose to establish that business were in my judgement thoroughly dishonest.

“You lied about the ownership of crucial equipment which was pivotal to your pitch on TV. You created a wholly false trail of documents to deceive well intentioned people.

“You have lied so many times about so many features that in my judgement I am entitled to regard that as an aggravating feature.

Jared Savage has written an article about benefit fraud. Apparently, shock horror, it has trebled from 5 years ago:

Benefit fraud cost taxpayers a record $22.6 million last year, and nine social welfare staff were sacked for ripping off the system.

Figures released to the Herald under the Official Information Act show fraud detected by the Ministry of Social Development has tripled from $7.5 million five years ago.

At that time, the ministry set up a fraud intelligence unit because of an international trend towards increasingly elaborate scams, including the use of stolen and faked identities, said chief executive Peter Hughes.

The ministry had also been embarrassed by Wayne Patterson, who used 123 fake identities to steal $3.4 million over two years – or $56,000 a fortnight – before he was caught in 2006 and jailed for eight years.

His offending is still the largest benefit fraud – the second largest amount stolen was $571,000 in 2008.

Oh right so it tripled because they are detecting it better…that is a good thing.

However it hasn’t tripled, the fraud has always been there and under Labour there was a dis-inclination to care about it.

But let me tell you…their fraud is quite a bit larger than $22 million. That is only what they publicly admit to. In private the numbers are more like $200 million. The trouble is most of the staff who can do anything about this are wombles who wear grey Julius Marlow double zip shoes, tan knee socks, tan walk shorts and yellow shorts with big lapels, even in summer they ear their grey cardigan with leather buttons. I know this because I have met them.

Back in 2000 their state of the art fraud department consisted of the aforementioned womble and a couple of helpers using state of the art analysis tools like Excel.

Proper data visualisation tools or appropriately designed farud detections suites were and probably still are non-existant. I know this must be the case because otherwise  the cases like Wayne Patterson’s wouldn’t be happening.

Looks like global warming has its benefits after all:

Human emissions of carbon dioxide will defer the next Ice Age, say scientists.

The last Ice Age ended about 11,500 years ago, and when the next one should begin has not been entirely clear.

Researchers used data on the Earth’s orbit and other things to find the historical warm interglacial period that looks most like the current one.

In the journal Nature Geoscience, they write that the next Ice Age would begin within 1,500 years – but emissions have been so high that it will not.

“At current levels of CO2, even if emissions stopped now we’d probably have a long interglacial duration determined by whatever long-term processes could kick in and bring [atmospheric] CO2 down,” said Luke Skinner from Cambridge University.

Dr Skinner’s group – which also included scientists from University College London, the University of Florida and Norway’s Bergen University – calculates that the atmospheric concentration of CO2 would have to fall below about 240 parts per million (ppm) before the glaciation could begin.

The current level is around 390ppm.

Other research groups have shown that even if emissions were shut off instantly, concentrations would remain elevated for at least 1,000 years, with enough heat stored in the oceans potentially to cause significant melting of polar ice and sea level rise.

Great news, I’d rather be hot than have an ice age….funny thing is the warmist would rather we all freeze, not that I care anyway it is a whole 1500 years way.

No not a lifestyle comparison, a regulatory authority and judicial comparison between NZ and Queensland:

The Queensland Government, determined to get back all of the A$11 million (NZ$14m) allegedly stolen by accused Queensland Health fraudster Joel Morehu-Barlow, has frozen assets including a blanket and a pillow.

Authorities are also seeking property belonging to Morehu-Barlow’s sister in their bid to recover some of the funds he allegedly siphoned from Queensland Health in the five years he worked there.

Morehu-Barlow is charged with defrauding Queensland Health of A$11m and is due to reappear in Brisbane Magistrates Court on Monday.

Police are also investigating allegations he stole a further A$5m.

In the Supreme Court in Brisbane yesterday, the Director of Public Prosecutions sought two further restraining orders on various items including motor vehicles and jet skis, the Courier-Mail reported.

The Government previously restrained property such as units, money, paintings, clothing and even a blanket and pillow.

Morehu-Barlow was not in court yesterday but Justice Martin Daubney said his lawyers had been told.

The state also sought to have property held by Morehu-Barlow’s sister Kelli-Ann Barlow restrained.

In Australia they charge you first, then they seek asset freezes. Here in New Zealand the statutory authorities conduct a PR exercise, hurl around accusations, then go to court but not to charge you, rather they seek to freeze your assets first, then they stretch out their investigation for more than a year and still ahve no charges laid, but continually tell the Judge that they are nearly there could the freeze please stay in place, and then when patience is almost at an end from the judge they say that they won’t be laying criminal charges which have a far higher threshold for the burden of proof, no instead they say that after Christmas that they might lay civil charges, which of course are still not laid. All this time the so far innocent party still has his assets frozen.

Looks like there is a veritable chasm between our two jurisdictions not only in competency but also in natural justice.

Seems like there are more Peter Freedom’s out there roaming the world on our ticket. National needs to boot the MSD wallies in the arse for ceasing data-matching.

Almost $19 million was overpaid in one year to people who left New Zealand while still receiving a benefit, Government documents show.

The true figure could be higher, as Social Development Ministry staff were told to stop looking for overpayments and concentrate instead on clearing the backlog of debt.

The data, revealed in the Office of the Privacy Commissioner’s annual report this month, shows weekly data checks with the Inland Revenue Department found 54,032 possible matches for overpaid clients.

Of these, 28,325 had been overpaid a total of $18,915,102 – an average of $667 each.

The commissioner’s report noted that the number and value of overpayments found by the ministry had doubled since the previous year.

“In September, MSD decided to cease matching work on some client cases (in advance of system changes) with Inland Revenue, and reallocate resources to this programme to clear a backlog of work.”

The ministry’s general manager of integrity services, Justine Auton, said it was a beneficiary’s duty to advise staff if they were leaving the country.

“These are clients who failed to meet their legal obligation and tell us that they were going overseas,” she said.

A rorting doctor who ripped off taxpayers health dollars to the tune of thousands had “good character” references from a couple of MPs.

An Auckland GP who has been punished for doctoring patients files to rort health authorities now faces losing his medical licence.

Dr Hong Sheng Kong, 44, of Pakuranga, was sentenced to a year’s home detention and 400 hours community service last November after he admitted dishonesty charges in the Auckland District Court.

At his Panmure practice thousands of alterations were made to computer records on which claims for taxpayer funding were based.

The amount of the fraudulent conduct was $183,134.

There is still a civil action pending amounting to over $3million from the ADHB. You have to wonder at the judgment of MPs who are giving character references for convicted fraudsters.

The 44-year-old GP’s lawyer, Harry Waalkens, QC, gave the tribunal excerpts of character references, including from National’s Jackie Blue and Labour’s Raymond Huo.

Arguing for a suspension from practising – to be imposed only if there was re-offending – he said Kong’s services as a Chinese-speaking doctor were needed here. He also said Mr Huo was a patient of Kong’s, was aware of the convictions and had said: “‘It would be a massive loss to the community if [Dr Kong's service] were no longer’ available.”

Mr Huo declined to discuss the matter with the Herald yesterday.

Dr Blue told the Herald Kong was genuinely remorseful for his mistakes, he was a good doctor and he had the support of the Chinese community.

The NBR has comments from the Police Association slamming the conduct of SFO Chief Executive Adam Feeley:

The conduct of Serious Fraud Office director Adam Feeley would not have been tolerated if the agency had merged with the police.

Police Association president Greg O’Connor gave a barbed answer when asked if Mr Feeley’s reported behaviour would be tolerated by senior members of the New Zealand Police.

“Mr Feeley’s probably very lucky there was no amalgamation,” Mr O’Connor said.

A merger of the SFO and the police was mooted in 2008 but the incoming National government scotched the proposal.

The National Business Review understands revelations about Mr Feeley’s conduct have caused Police Minister Judith Collins and the SFO considerable concern.

Of course it is concerning, this guy is supposed to be the top fraud cop in New Zealand and he shamefully lifted a bottle of plonk from the property of the receivers of a company that was subsequently charged byt eh Serious Fraud Office.

There is another concerning development in this who saga too:

NBR understands Mr Feeley is a member of Auckland’s Northern Club, having been sponsored into the exclusive membership by Crown solicitor and regular SFO prosecutor Simon Moore.

That is an outrageous conflict of interest. The Crown Solicitor must be above anything that suggests favours or untoward behaviour. There is no way that he should have sponsored Feeley into the Northern Club.

It will be interesting to know how much extra work Meredith Connell has gained since Feeley joined the Northern Club? All this smacks of the boys at the top end sorting out things for themselves with little or no regard to the law or to appearance.

Jared Savage has what surely must be the last nail in Adam Feeley’s coffin:

The head of the Serious Fraud Office gave copies of Allan Hubbard’s biography as “booby” prizes at a staff Christmas party while the former Rich Lister was under investigation.

Adam Feeley, the SFO chief executive, gave handcrafted wooden statues to winners at a joke prize-giving last December and paperback editions of “Allan Hubbard: A Man Out of Time” to the runners-up.

At the time, Mr Hubbard’s South Canterbury Finance was in statutory management after a $1.8 billionGovernment bailout and the Timaru accountant was being investigated by the SFO.

Six months after the Christmas party, the SFO laid 50 charges against the 83-year-old, who denied any wrongdoing.

The calls for his resignation are growing:

Pressure has mounted on Mr Feeley this week and yesterday, a top Auckland criminal lawyer called for his resignation over the champagne incident.

“He’s in a position of responsibility and I think he’s shown absolutely poor judgment,” said Criminal Bar Association president Tony Bouchier.

“They had a celebratory drink – that on its own is not so bad, but the SFO really have got to be seen to be absolutely unbiased.”

This latest incident just shows that the culture at the SFO under Adam Feeley has deteriorated significantly. THere can only be one person responsible for that.