An online fraudster who scammed his targets out of more than £100 million and spent it mainly on luxury cars has been jailed.
Tejay Fletcher, 35, who founded iSpoof, will spend 13 years and four months behind bars, London’s Southwark Crown Court ruled today.
The website, taken down in Britain’s biggest fraud sting, allowed scammers to pose as bank phone callers so they could gut people’s bank accounts.
Victims across the world were defrauded of at least £100,000,000, the court heard, with at least £43,000,000 from UK residents.
Fletcher bagged the ‘lion’s share’ of the around £3,200,000 in cryptocurrency Bitcoin, taking home some £2,000,000, prosecutor John Ojakovoh said.
He owned an east London property and used the looted money to buy a £230,000 Lamborghini.
His shopping list also included two Range Rovers for himself and his girlfriend and police found jewellery and an £11,000 Rolex watch in his home.
According to the Metropolitan Police, iSpoof – described as ‘an international one-stop spoofing shop’ – was set up in December 2020 and had more than 59,000 users.
Subscribers could pay in Bitcoin to use sophisticated tools to disguise their phone numbers as trusted ones, such as from banks, tax offices and other official bodies.
Some pretended to be some of Britain’s biggest banks such as Barclays, HSBC and Santander.
It was used to make 10,000,000 phone calls between June 2021 and July 2022, with, at one point, 20 people being phoned every minute.
Tricksters would, following the calls, then illegally crowbar people’s bank and log-in details to defraud their victims.
The largest single theft was £3,000,000, while on average, each target lost £10,000.
But as fraud is under-reported, the number is likely far higher, the Met added.
The force led an 18-month-long global probe into iSpoof as part of Operation Elaborate, the ‘UK’s largest ever proactive fraud operation’.
The Met worked with the US intelligence agency the FBI and Europol, the EU’s police agency, after launching the investigation in June 2021.
As of April, the Met has arrested 138 people involved with iSpoof, with some nabbed in the Netherlands, Australia, France and Ireland.
Some servers were also closed as part of the probe in the Netherlands and Ukraine.
Fletcher, of Western Gateway, last month pleaded guilty to four charges, including making or supplying an article for use in fraud, encouraging or assisting the commission of an offence, possession of criminal property and transferring criminal property, between November 30 2020 and November 8 2022.
Judge Sally Cahill KC said: ‘For all the victims it was a harrowing experience.’
‘Victims of the fraudsters who used your product report being persuaded to hand over hundreds of thousands and in one case two million pounds,’ she added.
‘They believed they were talking to bank employees and had to protect themselves from a potential fraud on their account.
‘They report their businesses suffering, significant financial problems, sleeplessness, depression and fallouts with family members. For all the victims it has been a harrowing experience.
‘I am told you are remorseful for your actions. In my judgement (your behaviour) indicates you didn’t care who the victims were or the impact on them.
‘Sadly, the remorse you now express did not extend to helping the police with their investigations or entering a guilty plea at the first instance.
‘Your late expression of remorse is more driven by your regret from being caught, rather than genuine empathy at the first instance.’
