Gable Investigation
We have been calling attention to Billy Dewsall’s new venture (after a narrow escape over Hogarth writing for a nonexistent Greek company) and have done some detailed analysis of the balance sheets of the Liechtenstein insurer and its Cayman Island (was BVI) owner. The results? A sum equivalent to more than half the premium income has been paid to guess who?
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Malchus Irvin R Boncamper
has been arrested in Florida as part of the roundup of insurance fraudsters involved with uninsured fatalities. Those involved also included a UK fraudster already on the run after escaping from jail, and a London market broker who operated in Texas.
Dominion of Melchizedek Arrest
The leader of this "Nation" that seems to exist only on the internet, although claiming a number of domiciles, all of them owned by someone else, has been arrested. In a long and varied career, changing his name a number of times, he has used his nation to licence a number of crooked insurers and banks,some of them used by Lloyds brokers.
BEEMA, YOUELL, RUTLEDGE AND A CAST OF THOUSANDS
In our ongoing coverage of the series of frauds that have caused a dozen U S states to issue cease & desist orders, many old friends are popping out of the woodwork. It has been a little while since we have had cause to mention Colin Jack Youell, although he has been in and out of these pages for most of the twenty five years we have been chronicling the cheats and thieves in our market. Some year or so ago, we warned that he had become a director of an international Insurance company, and that we expected the usual crooked outcome. Well, that has come to pass.
The company is Beema Pakistan, which has been barred from trading in its home nation for financial irregularities, the authorities claiming that the vast majority of its millions in capital and shares were dependent on fraudulent land transactions. The chairman, of course, denies it. Youell had been part of the scheme whereby a purported subsidiary of Beema, of no fixed abode was used to front up thousands of Healthcare policies. Some $14m of premiums re mentioned in the indictments of just a few of the conspirators. There is a full list of those involved in the stories we have been printing. Then there is Melde Rutledge who, using pseudonyms, was officer of some of the trusts that squirreled away the money, and has a career that involves, under other names, wrecking a Czech bank, and using the remains to form a fraudulent insurer in the US, and sell policies from that. Then there is at least one large broker who was issuing marine policies in the insurers name, paying claims out of the premiums, and remitting only the net balance to the insurer.
However, we would be remiss if we did not give you their full CV’s. It starts, way back in 1987.
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DENMARK WARNS OVER TWO INSURERS INVOLVED IN U.S. FRAUDULENT HEALTHCARE.
Another of those characters we have been writing about for years has turned up with two Texas operators with a history of bent insurers.
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BEEKMEYER IN KENYA.We mentioned in our article in April 2009 his long and interesting career, including Dai Ichi Kyoto Re, North American Fidelity and Guarantee, Stirling Cooke Brown, Kendalman Insurance, Avia and Ian McCall. All of these institutions are now deceased, with fraud allegations lingering over them.
Our point in 2009 was that he had come up in connection with a scam in Kenya, whereby he was going to put up $20m to establish an office in Nairobi. This was via an unheard of investment group
He was going to contribute $15m towards the Umoja Womens Entrepreneur Programme, an organization providing microfinance to women entrepreneurs. That doesn’t appear to have happened. He has been spotted drinking with another refugee from the UK insurance market, who has left a trail of litigation over binders from the Middle East. He has now, despite his record, managed to get his Kenyan insurer licenced, and is entering the international market place.
TWO GREEK CEO's CHARGED
We seem to be the only insurance journal covering the fallout from the submission to the auditors of Aspis Pronia of a $100m letter of credit. An Athens prosecutor has filed felony fraud charges against the former president and CEO of the Aspis Insurance group, Pavlos Psomiadis. It also transpires that at least one branch manager was selling his own unauthorised investment plans rather than the companies. Signatures of actuaries and regulators are alleged to be missing or wrongly obtained.
The group’s financial director (now departed) was also charged with simple complicity to commit fraud. District attorney, Evangelos Ioannidis, filed felony fraud charges against Psomiadis. Aspis has been closed down
Now we have become aware of a second Greek insurer found using fraudulent assets among its balance sheet. That CEO has been charged as well. Click here to learn more
Condor Re writing London market business
Condor Re, the Barbados successor to Nevis based Condor Insurance, has been chosen to replace PCI (see arrest story) on some risks.
The liquidation of Condor Insurance has involved Krollsa in a lenghty series of liquidation, as it attempts to recover assets,including premiums transferred to Condoe Re as "reinsurance".
The ruling that denied Krolls, the liquidator of Nevis insurer Condor Insurance the right to recover funds allegedly removed from the company by its US controller has been overturned on appeal. The litigation surrounding its successor, Condor Guarantee, in the Bahamas, who allegedly “reinsured” the Nevis company, is ongoing, with a number of UK unpaid claims in the balance. Action against the UK brokers involved is being considered Click here to learn more
GRESHAM INSURANCE BROKERS.
LLoyds broker Gresham has failed, and is under investigation by the F.S.A. We have been warning about this company, and some of the strange people seen wandering through its doors for some time. It’s US backer has now been sentenced for the employers liability insurance scam he committed with associates, after serving time previously for insurance fraud. Further, in another U.S. state a cease and desist order over the sale for investment of viaticals has named a representative of Gresham as being part of the deal. A new company has been formed to continue the business, although not all members of Gresham have been carried over. Click here to learm more
Foreclosure Frauds Grow And Insurers Must Cover Shortfalls
The largest foreclosure law firm in Florida has annual revenues of $260m, and is involved in multiple mis-signed court applications and assignments.
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Ambac Liquidated
After months of coverage about rising troubles at bond insurer Ambac over its involvement in sub prime mortgages; it has now bowed to its creditors and opted for liquidation. Many other insurers have similar problems, and the dominoes have not stopped falling.
Ukraines Ex P.M. Jailed
A past Prime Minister of the Ukraine has been convicted of transporting stolen property in the U.S. whist on $86m bail and has been jailed for insurance/banking fraud via a string of companies, that include both an insurer and a bank in Antigua.
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Gibraltar Lawyers For Trial
The founding partners of a well known Gibraltar law firm have been suspended after the regulator accused them of falsifying documents to conceal a missing 1.8m belonging to a client.
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Northern Cypus Insurer Helps Hannover Move €50m to Bail Out a Subsidiary
Bermudan Death Linked to Series of Frauds
This is a long and tortuous tale surrounding a Florida hedge fund, its Bermudan subsidiary, and people involved who have also been involved in false visa applications, money laundering, Ponzi schemes and printing worthless bonds for sale to Florida residents. The death certificate of its Bermudan manager states “Suicide due to colchicine overdose, and his Butterfield bank accounts, and that of the linked local company, have been frozen, despite a court order for the bank to allow “reasonable expenses”.
Indian Fraudulent Insurer
The Indian authorities have warned of an unlicenced insurer, which from our enquiries claims to be part of a Pan-Indian, composite financial services provider, and whose top man claims he has a degree, from the “University of the United Kingdom”. The nearest we can find to that is the Open University, and you would remember, surely, where you got your MBA. It says so at the top of the degree.
Tim Barker Sentenced
English law on “sub-judice proceedings have prevented us for almost two years from more than mentioning obliquely the case of Besso alternative products division leader Tim Barker.
It is now possible to detail the previous conviction for stealing £35,000, which was not reported by Besso to the FSA.
WET Computing
At one stage of the computer game “Sid Meirs Civ 4” the Tech tree allows you to develop computing, with the quoted comment “Never trust a computer you can’t throw out of the window.” Well, Euan Nicolson, a Marsh broker who joined Aon, went one better. He threw it in a pond. And some memory sticks into a river. Apart from polluting the environment (with which he has not been charged) he faced a hearing for contempt of court, since the judge had ordered him specifically not to do so. Oops. Marsh obtained a court order for Nicolson to not destroy or tamper with items that may have been used to help Aon win the contract.
