Alexandru Sovu is an internationally wanted fraudster who made ‘skimmers’ which steal bank machine users’ details. He operated in the UK but is now thought to be in Romania or China
A judge said he may never use a cash machine again after hearing how a Romanian fraudster sold devices for skimming bank cards.
Alexandru Sovu, 39, designed ‘skimmers’ and ATM fronts, which were sold to criminals in New York, Jamaica, Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, Ghana and the Philippines, in a £3million scam.
The 39-year-old – whose last known address was in Reading – was convicted of fraud charges and sentenced in his absence after he went on the run and is believed to be in China or Romania.
Sovu was one of a gang of fraudsters sentenced over the scam. Romanian crime boss Ionel Baluta and Andrei Baloui were jailed over the scam. Anca Fuioaga was convicted of fraud charges while Baluta’s wife Paula Cioaca was cleared of any involvement.
Blackfriars Crown Court heard Baluta and Baloui built the skimmers in a back garden shed in Colchester, Essex. Sovu worked on software to help fraudsters use stolen data and Fuioaga was said to have met up with buyers.
Sovu was convicted alongside Anca Fuioaga (left). Paula Cioaca (right), the wife of another fraud gang member, was cleared of any involvement
Prosecutor Michael Shaw told the court: ‘What’s been designed is a form of interception called a ‘skimmer’. So when you put your card into a cash machine or a London transport ticket machine you need to be alert because what criminals have designed is a method of catching the data as you put your card in and wait.
‘We are talking about millions of pounds of fraud if you can get the data that’s contained on this small piece of plastic.’
Judge Rajeev Shetty said: ‘I know for one that I will never use an ATM machine again with such confidence.’
Sovu has been missing since last Thursday and is believed to be in either Romania or China. The court heard it was likely he had forged new identity documents and is carrying on with his money-making scheme.
Mr Shaw told the court: ‘He’s a very industrious and intelligent man but he is also a thoroughly dishonest man.
‘Without the technology Mr Sovu has designed and developed, much of the crime we will hear in this trial could not have happened.’
Ionel Baluta (left) and Andrei Baloui manufactured the fraud machines from a shed in Essex
After he was arrested on similar charges back in 2010, Sovu moved to China, and appointed Fuioaga as his ‘UK representative’.
The prosecutor added: ‘This was a seven day a week, eight hours a day operation.
Judge Rajeev Shetty (above) said he would never again use an ATM ‘with such confidence’
‘We would suggest that Baluta was operating a crime with other people from various other criminal networks all over the world.’
The gang was finally stopped in 2016 after British Transport Police officers identified suspects interfering with rail ticket machines.
Baluta has previous convictions across Europe, including three in Italy for ‘similar criminality’ dating back to 2006′.
In 2010 he was jailed for three years in Romania after being convicted of six counts of fraud for card skimming and being part of a criminal organisation.
He was given four months in Denmark for computer fraud in 2013 and was expelled from the country for six years.
The prosecutor said of Sovu: ‘He is a man on wanted lists all over the world. This case may well appear in the papers over the next few days and his image will be circulated widely.’
The gang manufacturer ‘skimmers’ to steal car holders’ details at cash points. File photo
Sovu, previously of Reading, was convicted of one count of conspiracy to make and supply articles for use in fraud, one count of possessing of criminal property, one count of transferring of criminal property, and one count of failing to comply with a disclosure notice.
Fuioaga, of Romford, denied but was convicted of one count of conspiracy to make and supply articles for use in fraud and one count of transferring criminal property. They will be sentenced next Monday.
Baloui was previously sentenced to five years for his part while three other gang members. Baluta was jailed for his absence for five and a half years in Italy in February 2016.