The Old Bailey ordered for £658,460.84 to be confiscated from a ‘ghost broker’ currently imprisoned for masterminding what is believed to be the UK’s biggest fake car insurance scam.
Danyal Buckharee, aged 44 (DOB 07.08.70), must repay the confiscated amount as compensation to his victims within six months or face five more years behind bars.
The action came yesterday (Thursday 25th June) after the City of London Police’s Insurance Fraud Enforcement Department (IFED) applied to the court to recover the profits of his crimes in 2013 after its investigation saw him jailed for three years.
This was on top of four-and-a-half years given for a separate fraud investigated by the Metropolitan Police Service.
Buckharee duped 600 drivers, including young people insuring their first car, into buying worthless car insurance between May 2011 and April 2012, pocketing £658,460.84 which he spent on his mistress and in casinos.
He created four websites offering ‘cheap’ car insurance – Aston Midshires Insurance, Astuto Insurance, Car Insurance Warehouse and First Car Direct Insurance – and used paid-for advertising to ensure his online enterprises appeared at the top of internet search engines.
City of London Police Financial Investigator, Simon Styles, who led IFED’s confiscation action, said: “Buckharee went to great lengths to sell his bogus car insurance, creating a series of sham websites to tempt drivers across the country.
“He left them unwittingly on the roads without valid cover, exposing them to massive risks including having to pick up the bill for any damage or injuries they caused in a crash, getting their vehicle seized by police, fines, penalties and a criminal record.
“The court confiscating hundreds of thousands of pounds from Buckharee shows committing insurance fraud ultimately does not pay.
“This is also further evidence of how the Insurance Fraud Enforcement Department is working on behalf of innocent motorists to put fraudsters behind bars and then take the assets gained through their criminality.”
Aston Midshires Insurance first came to the attention of the Motor Insurers’ Bureau (MIB) in late 2011 when the bureau began receiving complaints from drivers who had been stopped by police for driving without insurance.
The MIB passed the complaints onto the Insurance Fraud Bureau (IFB), an organisation which acts as a central data hub for the insurance industry to detect and disrupt organised motor fraud, for further examination. When IFED launched in January 2012, the complaints were handed to the new unit.
IFED detectives swiftly identified links between Aston Midshires Insurance and two other websites – Astuto Insurance and Car Insurance Warehouse.
Detectives traced the victims’ money to a series of accounts opened at bank branches in south west London and Lincolnshire.
Further enquiries revealed that the victims’ money was withdrawn from those bank accounts in large quantities via cash points in south west London.
A myriad of telephone numbers belonging to pay-as-you-go mobile phones were used by Buckharee, one of which led IFED to a riverside penthouse in the Imperial Wharf area of London in April 2012, where detectives arrested his mistress.
From there, they tracked Buckharee to a riverside apartment in Wandsworth, London, where he was arrested. Detectives found the living room had been turned into an operations centre for another website, First Car Direct Insurance, prompting them to seize laptops, bank cards, mobile phones and insurance documentation including fake insurance certificates.
In the flat a list of fictitious insurance sales staff was found. An audio recording of office noise was also discovered which it is understood Buckharee played while on the telephone to prospective customers.
The investigation team had the website shut down and the associated bank accounts frozen – which prevented £28,000 being lost by victims.
In February 2013, Buckharee admitted two counts of fraud relating to the Aston Midshires Insurance and First Car Direct Insurance websites and three counts of money laundering in relation to the four websites during an appearance at the Old Bailey. He was remanded in custody until sentencing.
In October 2013, Buckharee was sentenced to three years in prison to be served consecutively to a four-and-a-half year jail term given as a result of being convicted of fraud following a separate investigation by the Metropolitan Police Service.
Ben Fletcher, Director of the IFB, said: “This was a calculated crime which left hundreds of people severely out of pocket and unwittingly exposed to the dangers of driving without insurance. Unfortunately, the activities of Danyal Buckharee are not an isolated incident as the IFB is now managing 24 cross-industry ‘ghost broking’ investigations and is working with insurers and 10 police forces, including the Insurance Fraud Enforcement Department, to help bring these fraudsters to justice.”
Ashton West, Chief Executive of MIB, said: “The scam first came to light when drivers being stopped by police were claiming to be insured by Aston Midshires – a company unknown to MIB. Through the diligence of MIB’s Police Helpline and investigations by the Bureau a suspected ghost broker at work was revealed, which was immediately reported to the Insurance Fraud Bureau and Insurance Fraud Enforcement Department.
“Exposing this scam and securing prison sentences for the criminals behind it highlights the industry’s determination to tackle fraud from all angles. But motorists also need to protect themselves from ghost broking by being wary of deals that seem too good to be true.”
Anyone who believes they have fallen victim to a ghost broker should contact Action Fraud.
Advice for drivers on how to secure the cheapest legitimate insurance policy possible is available here.
Information on suspected ghost brokers can be reported confidentially through the Insurance Fraud Bureau’s Cheatline, powered by Crimestoppers, on 0800 422 0421.