JEFF PRESTRIDGE: Inspired by Police Squad!, how a company director turned the tables on a hapless fraudster

Financial scams are a fact of life. Sadly, despite efforts by the banks and regulators to make them more difficult to perpetrate, the criminals always seem one step ahead.

A few days ago I was contacted by a director of a firm of chartered financial planners in London whose name and company had been used by fraudsters to tempt one of his clients to invest in an ‘investment portfolio’.

The client, thank God, didn’t fall for it, but the attempted fraud shows what lengths criminals will go to persuade us to part with our hard-earned money.

It all started with an email last month allegedly from Jim Harrison, who in real life is a director of Master Adviser, a firm which specialises in building income-friendly portfolios for those in retirement. It is based on Chancery Lane in London.

The email was sent to one of Jim’s clients. It invited him to set up a Banking Circle cash management portfolio with the promise of 8.52 per cent income, fixed for 12 months. This was on an investment of £200,000. On the surface, mightily attractive.

For the record, Banking Circle is a Luxembourg-registered company with its UK operations regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) – and offers a range of banking services, including deposit services.

As they had with Jim’s details, the fraudsters had cloned its name. ‘We have a long-term relationship with Banking Circle,’ Jim’s clone said in the email. ‘I recommend we set up a Banking Circle cash management portfolio for you.

‘It will serve as a good savings vehicle to retain the value of your funds while also benefiting from interest rate growth.’

Jim’s impersonator assured the client that his money would be protected by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (up to £85,000) in the event of Banking Circle going bust.

The email ended: ‘Let me know what you think. Kind regards, Jim.’ It gave Jim’s business address and confirmed that Master Adviser was also regulated by the FCA.

Convincing though the email seemed to be, the client contacted the real Jim who confirmed that his details had been cloned and that the email was a scam.

‘It was a clever email,’ Jim told me last week. ‘The only giveaways were the opening line which read, ‘I hope you are doing great and having a wonderful week.’ I would never use such effusive language when sending an email to clients.’

The other giveaway, he said, is that the email had been sent from Jim Harrison at masteradvisers.co.uk – as opposed to the real masteradviser.co.uk.

Riled by the attempted fraud using his name, Jim thought that he would strike back.

Mischievously, he set up a dummy email address in the name of Dutch Gundersen, a nod to a money-launderer in the 1980s American comedy series Police Squad! featuring the wonderful late Leslie Nielsen as Sergeant Frank Drebin, Detective Lieutenant.

In the series, Dutch Gunderson (not Gundersen) was played by Al Ruscio, while Nielsen went on to play Drebin in the hugely successful Naked Gun films.

‘I’ve watched the Police Squad! series hundreds of times,’ said Jim. ‘I can’t get enough of it.’

Jim, now Dutch, emailed his clone asking for details about the portfolio service. It wasn’t Jim who responded but Luke Morley who sent the same product details fake Jim had given the client of the real Jim (stay with me). Luke said Jim was away on holiday.

Dutch responded by saying he didn’t have £200,000 but would be happy to invest about half that amount. Luke said that would be fine, saying: ‘Let me know what you think and if I should go ahead and set up an account for you.’

Dutch requested the necessary forms and said he would be able to call in at Master Adviser’s address on Chancery Lane if he needed to sign anything.

Luke replied by saying that he would set up the investment portfolio and send through the confirmation documents.

Luke then rang Dutch (using a withheld number) asking whether he had received the documents – and to give him the passcode necessary (gundersen__dutch) to open up the confirmation notice confirming his intended investment (£100,000), the one-year 8.52 fixed rate of interest, and where he should send the money to. Not directly to Banking Circle, but an account with Banking Circle in the name of Alpha Trading.

The ensuing 15-minute conversation between them is wonderfully entertaining as Dutch starts asking awkward questions that the fraudster avoids answering.

‘You work for Master Adviser. Where are you based?’ asked Dutch.

‘We can be anywhere in the country. We work remotely. Jim is on holiday.’

Luke goes on to say how exclusive Banking Circle is. ‘It’s amazing, I’m really excited,’ said Dutch. He then asked Luke again where Master Adviser is based. ‘Just in London,’ is the response.

‘I assume you’re on a road in London,’ said Dutch. Luke avoids answering.

Dutch wasn’t giving up. ‘Just tell me your address. You have an office in London. London is quite big. I don’t want to have to knock on every door in London asking for you. I’m about to put a lot of money with you. There is a relationship here.’

He continued: ‘If I Google Jim Harrison at Master Adviser, would I get an email or a physical address?’ Luke doesn’t give an answer, but two minutes later he mentions that the office is actually on Chancery Lane.

Dutch is excited. ‘I can pop in and see you,’ he said. ‘Are you in there today? I could do now. Where are you based on Chancery Lane. I’m also on Chancery Lane.’

‘OK, what time?’ asks Luke. ‘Next five minutes,’ responded Dutch. ‘Unfortunately, I’m not that easily available,’ is Luke’s limp response.

Dutch then asked for his and Jim’s number so that he can ring one of them back. ‘Just give me a number,’ he pleaded.

‘I can’t just give out a number,’ said Luke. ‘It’s not how we work.’

Dutch had had enough. ‘So you’re in Chancery Lane but you can’t see me. And you can’t give me your number.’

Luke promised to ring Dutch back. He didn’t but he sent an email on Thursday asking whether Dutch had made the payment. Reassuringly, Jim Harrison has yet to hear from any other clients who have received the same fraudulent email.

This suggests it was his client’s email account that was hacked by the fraudster, not his.

Harrison said it is despicable that fraudsters such as Luke Morley are preying on investors, often elderly people. ‘More needs to be done to track down these criminals and lock them up,’ he added. ‘Luke was not phoning me from overseas – he was UK based and as British as they come.’

On Friday, after I contacted Banking Circle and provided it with details about the fraud, it closed Alpha Trading’s bank account. Result!

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