As soon as the men arrived on island, police say, they embarked on a spending spree, purchasing luxurious designer jewellery, colognes and expensive electronic items, such as tablets, laptops and earphones.
“The bravado and condescending behaviour of these men while they were actively pulling off the con could be seen on the CCTV footage,” said Detective Kumar White, who headed up the investigation.
“We could see the men doing high-fives and low-fives with the sales reps each time a transaction went through on one of stolen credit or debit cards,” he added.
Obaseki, 33, and Capers and Luke, both 32, had racked up a bill of more than US$92,000 less than one week after their arrival.
Almost made a clean escape
Celine Macken, the financial controller of Kirk Freeport, said their store was one of the locations targeted.
Michael Capers was charged with four counts of obtaining property by deception with a value of approximately US$50,000.
“They distracted our sales representatives with talks about them being real-estate tycoons and business owners who were here on vacation, and when one card declined, they would hand them another while still distracting them,” she said. “Unfortunately, their distractions worked, and the representatives didn’t check the names on the cards.”
The men might have gotten away with it, if it weren’t for their greed.
“At another store, the store clerk was so excited about the sale after the men left that he called his boss and said, ‘Guess what, I just sold all of the Apple products’,” White said.
White told the Compass that the store’s owner became suspicious and immediately began looking over the transactions, during which he discovered the cards were all in different names, causing him to report the matter to police.
The swift action allowed officers to track the men down to their Airbnb villa where they found them with more than 70 items, all purchased on the stolen cards.
Of the 40 stolen cards, police were able to identify scores of victims from several US states and European countries.
The men were each charged with obtaining property by deception, to which they pleaded guilty and were sentenced to 18 months in prison.
“This is not an isolated incident. We are currently investigating similar crimes with individuals from South and Central America, South Africa, and other US states, in addition to other countries,” Bradshaw said.
He noted that his team has since closed in on criminals using card-skimming machines and devices here in Cayman.
Police have found deep-insert skimming devices, like the one above, in ATMs in Cayman. – Photo: RCIPS
The global fight against skimming
According to the US Federal Bureau of Investigations, tens of thousands of people across the US fall victim to card fraud every year after unknowingly having their information stolen via skimming devices installed in ATMs, at fuel pumps and other point-of-sale machines.
“It is estimated that skimming costs financial institutions and consumers more than $1 billion (USD) each year,” notes the FBI on its website.
In the UK, similar statistics have been reported.
According to UK Finance, an official government website, more than £1.2 billion (CI$1.3 billion) was stolen through fraud in 2022, with that number expected to have increased in 2023.
Other card skimmers include overlay devices that are attached to point-of-sale machines. – Photo: RCIPS
In Cayman, police estimate as many as 36 people may have had their card information compromised after officers seized a card skimmer that was inserted into an ATM.
White told the Compass that, in that investigation, the suspects installed a camera that recorded the victims while they were entering their PIN.
“We have made an arrest in that matter and progress is under way,” said White, who added that not much more information could be provided at this time.
‘We are in this together’
“We are in business,” Macken, of Kirk Freeport, said, “and as a result, it is natural to be competitive, but not when it comes to thieves and criminals. We have to work together and we do work together.”
Several of Cayman’s retailers and business owners have formed small, informal electronic messaging groups where they pass on information about potentially suspicious people or crimes that might have recently occurred.
“This kind of teamwork should be praised,” White said. “Because of the swift thinking of the store owner and his decision to report the matter, we were able to quickly get to these men before their departure.”
Dave Obaseki, Michael Capers and Sean Luke seen on CCTV footage purchasing dozens of high-end electronic items with fraudulent credit cards, which would eventually lead to their undoing.
According to statistics released by the Financial Crime Investigation Unit, officers dealt with 106 reported incidents of a financial nature, along with 50 active crimes in 2023. The most common types of financial crimes were obtaining property by deception and forgery of documents.
As much as CI$952,537 and US$1.1 million was recovered.
It’s not clear what percentage of that money was from debit and credit card fraud.
Unlike assault crimes, which may leave permanent scars and/or lasting physical injuries that quickly identify a victim, no such visible signs exist with these scams, often causing the matter to go out of sight and out of mind.
Nonetheless, the harm done can be just as devastating, forcing businesses to shut their doors and lay off staff. On a personal level, many victims see their savings wiped out, leaving them with crushing debt, police say.
But as long as fraudsters target Cayman, Bradshaw warns, “Those people who would seek to exploit Cayman and our businesses must know that police, prosecutors and the courts are ready and waiting to do our part to prevent it from happening, and if it does happen, we will not stop until justice is served.”
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Publish date : 2024-07-28 18:01:00
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