Indian phone scammers duped elderly into cancer drugs

Two members of an Indian gang of phone scammers who fleeced thousands of pounds from the elderly in cold calls have been jailed for a total of eight years.

The gang used high pressure sales techniques to sell victims bogus supplements at ten times the high street price, even claiming they could prevent cancer.

Money launderers Fredy Fernandes and Salvador Rodrigues, based in Peterborough, would then receive the money into business bank accounts and send it on to India.

Fernandes, 44, and Rodrigues, 44, were both jailed for four years at St Albans Crown Court after they were found guilty of acquiring criminal property.

Salvador Rodrigues

Money launderers Fredy Fernandes (left) and Salvador Rodrigues (right) are shown outside St Albans Crown Court ahead of their trial

The gang was rumbled after pensioners ranging in age from 80 to 94 complained of ‘pushy’ sellers who ‘would not take no for an answer’. 

During their trial, the jury heard how the scam was run from India, from where a team of high pressure sales people targeted vulnerable pensioners in the UK.

The vitamins they had sold pensioners had been manufactured in India and shipped to Britain, where tests found they had no beneficial value whatsoever.

Although the pair were not involved in selling the goods, they had had control of the two company bank accounts used to launder the money that came rolling in.

Pensioners charged up to £400 for a box of bogus vitamins

  • One 80-year-old widow was charged £399 by House of Naturecare for a box of vitamins in January or February last year. She received a further call in March, paying £197.83 for 13 bottles of vitamins to Nutri Care Quest. In May, she received another call from a representative who ‘would not take no for an answer.’
  • An 84-year-old paid £389.99 on 5 February last year and, in late March or early April, paid another £147.
  • An 80-year-widow from Leighton Buzzard was charged £399 for 10 bottles of rosehip extract and 4 bottles of multivitamins. She told the jury that the telephone caller took her band card details after telling her that the tablets would help her arthritis and general health. 
  • Mr Johnson, a 94-year-old man from Welwyn Garden City, said he wastold that Omega Oil tablets could prevent lung cancer. He agreed to order a box in December 2015, but did not remember any discussion of a price. He was charged £154.95. Then in January last year he ordered a second box, following a similar call, and was charged £498.88.  

Recorder Samantha Cohen told the pair that the scam they had been part of had left elderly victims ‘distressed and anxious and shattered their confidence’.

Some had lived in fear of persistent cold calls and, because of the embarrassment they felt, had not told their families what was happening. 

Prosecutor Andrew Johnson said: ‘They defrauded some of the most vulnerable members of society, playing on fears as to their health in order to raid their wallets.

‘It is about the elderly and infirm being sold vitamins and other food and dietary supplements that they did not need, at grossly excessive prices.’ 

Mr Fernandes was convicted of converting £111,352 of criminal property that was paid into a Santander bank account held in the name of House of Naturecare Ltd.

He was also found guilty of acquiring criminal property in the sum of £15,590 that had been paid to him.

Mr Rodrigues was found guilty of converting £238,495 of criminal property that was paid into a Lloyds bank account in the name of Nutri Care Quest Limited.

He too was convicted of acquiring criminal property in the sum of £10,060 that had been paid to him.

They had claimed they were innocent, having been brought in by others in India to run the business. 

Their home in Peterborough was raided on September 22 last year, where boxes of vitamins, invoices and address labels were recovered.

The prosecutor said others were involved in the businesses, including three people in India.

How to beat the phone scammers 

Register for the Telephone Preference Service (TPS) free on 0345 070 0707 or at tpsonline.org.uk. Firms will then be breaking the law if they make unwanted sales calls.

The TPS today launches a free mobile phone app called TPS Protect which rates incoming calls on a ‘trust score’ of one to five. Five means the caller is from a firm with low complaints. One means it is a suspected scam.

BT customers can get its free BT Protect service that won’t allow calls from nuisance numbers it is aware of. You can add 100 other numbers to your blacklist.

Sky Talk Shield is free for its broadband and landline customers. It asks callers to state their name then plays it back to you so you can decide whether to take calls. You can block up to 1,000 numbers.

Trading Standards has 1,500 free TrueCall call-blocking gadgets to give away to vulnerable people. You can also buy the device for £100 (truecall.co.uk or call 0800 0 336 330).

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