A despicable conman who duped an elderly couple in Tayside out of more than £20,000 has been jailed for more than 13 years.
Vulnerable and elderly people were conned out of £250,000 in a Scotland-wide scam while Derek Moore posed as a bank fraud investigator.
Victims were persuaded they were being targeted at bank branches and Moore was an investigator.
In some cases their bank cards were taken from them.
Judge Lord young told Moore, 42, at the High Court in Edinburgh: “The frauds which you perpetrated on elderly and vulnerable people were particularly cruel.”
He said: “This was a highly sophisticated operation which involved significant levels of planning and deception.”
More than £280,000 was gained or sought through the scam between August 2021 and February 2022 in Dundee, Perth and elsewhere in Scotland.
Moore, formerly of Chapel Street, Rutherglen, in South Lanarkshire, earlier admitted five charges of fraud committed while acting with others.
Moore also impersonated a police officer to get his hands on two shotguns which were lawfully held by one of the victims of the bank scam.
He admitted two charges of illegal possession of shotguns and a further offence of being concerned in the supply of heroin.
He was jailed for 13-and-a-half years.
Tayside couple ripped off
The court heard Moore contacted one couple by phone and told the woman he was from her bank fraud team.
He got them to attend at a luxury jeweller in Dundee to buy a watch before travelling to Glasgow to hand the timepiece to him.
He also induced them to hand over the man’s bank cards and purchased a bracelet using a card.
He also used them and the man’s driving licence in an attempt to get money from a Glasgow bank branch.
The victims were also persuaded to go to a bank in Perth and transfer £20,000 to another account.
Further frauds
An 83-year-old woman was called by Moore pretending to be from her bank fraud team.
She went to a bank branch in Johnstone, Renfrewshire, and withdrew £15,000 and went to the town’s railway station to hand the cash over to him.
She was also induced to transfer a further £20,000 to another bank account.
A 70-year-old man in Dundonald, Ayrshire, was contacted by the fraudster and persuaded to make transactions transferring money from his account.
An 80-year-old woman attended a bank branch in Musselburgh High Street after being contacted by the fake investigator and transferred £15,000 to an account in the name of Priya Seta.
Moore also got her bank cards, account numbers and PINs to withdraw £1500 and attempt to get a further £3600.
An 85-year-old woman was targeted in the scam and more than £80,000 was extracted after she attended bank branches in Lerwick to make transfers of money and online banking was set up in her name.
Moore’s former girlfriend Julie McQuade, 31, of Cambuslang, South Lanarkshire, was jailed for 30 months after she took part in the fraud against the woman on Shetland.
Guns and heroin
Moore took possession of two of guns, while masquerading as a police officer, from one of the fraud victims who legally owned the weapons.
Police recovered heroin worth almost £2000 and a further firearm at Moore’s flat in Rutherglen on February 18 2022.
Defence counsel Graham Robertson said his client Moore previously worked as a chef, but suffered ill health in recent years.
He said there was no suggestion that Moore was the mastermind behind the criminal scheme and appeared to have been “very much a foot soldier”.
He said what brought Moore to court were matters that could be described as “pretty despicable”.
Kelly Duling, counsel for McQuade, maintained her client was a vulnerable person who had a traumatic background.
The pair originally stood trial at Ayr Sheriff Court and pled guilty during the proceedings.
The sheriff, who can impose a maximum term of five years’ imprisonment, sent the case to the High Court because of its greater sentencing powers.
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