A convicted drug dealer had his fingers burned when he was caught up in a bank card scam that netted the brains of the operation £130,000.
But Swindon Magistrates’ Court was told Daniel Withers played only a tiny part in the fraud scam, which between May and November 2017 saw a woman call MBNA and Capital One posing as real customers.
The woman, who has not been identified by police, managed to pass security measures and requested to change the address linked to the account, increase credit limits or add her “husband” as a named credit card holder.
Prosecutor Emma Charleton said the fraudsters had obtained the pin numbers and used the cards. More than £130,000 was spent by the fraudsters, although the banks had managed to stop around £44,000-worth of expenditure.
The fraudsters had also transferred cash to accounts. They included the bank account of Daniel Withers.
His account was wired £4,765 on October 24, 2017 and another £4,850 three days later. The money came from the accounts of two women, who had been refunded by the banks.
CCTV showed Withers going into his bank and withdrawing the cash.
Ms Charleton said there was no evidence to suggest Withers was involved in the wider card fraud, but he was party to it. In interview he suggested he had come under pressure to allow his account to be used.
Defending, Mark Glendenning said his client had taken out the cash from his bank and handed it straight over to another outside. His part in the scam had been “doomed to failure”.
Withers, 24, of Little Englands, Chippenham, pleaded guilty to two counts of possession of criminal cash. The court heard he was currently on a suspended sentence imposed in 2018 for supplying cannabis. He had completed all his unpaid work.
Sentencing him to a 12 month community order and 200 hours unpaid work, chairman of the bench Martin Clarke said: “You must have known what was going on. Somebody asked you to take money out of a bank account – your bank account – and you knew very well you didn’t have those sums of money in there.
“You knew this was going to be an act of dishonesty. You must have known because nobody’s going to give you £9,000 out of the goodness of their heart.”
He was ordered to pay £9,615 compensation to the banks.
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