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FANCY GOING STRAIGHT, GARY? ; We catch up with 15 year career conman [Mirror (UK)](Mirror (UK) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) DOES this jailbird touch anything that isn't bent? Gary Massingham, AKA Gary Moore, is a career conman with a 15-year record of ripping people off. Even a stint inside hasn't stopped him, so we've pulled together his CV as a warning. MASSING-SCAM 1 Gary was a failed businessman by his mid-20s, after his firm Mister Print PLC shut down in 1994, owing pounds 124,000. That same year he set up Ashcroft Conservatories Ltd, with younger brother Jason. But there were soon more than 100 complaints from angry clients who had typically paid pounds 5,000-plus for conservatories which were never finished. pounds The Massinghams had nicked pictures from the brochures of a rival firm to use in their own. Gary denied it before he was arrested and charged, along with two others, with conspiracy to defraud. Those charges were left on file when Gary pleaded guilty to his next fraud. MASSING-SCAM 2 Massingham helped set up a string of luxury car hire firms, buying a fleet of vehicles "using money from a failed venture", the Serious Fraud Office said. Gary, his dad Tony and accomplice Mark Roe set up four companies with names such as Marque One Rentals and Elite Rentals, but investigators found they were "simply a vehicle for fraud". Victims paid more than pounds 1million, but large deposits were never returned by the crooks, who pretended vehicles had been damaged. A SFO spokesman said: "The heart of the dishonesty lay in the cynical system of obfuscation put in place to prevent customers getting their deposits back." Each desk had four telephones with notes reminding the shysters which false names to use when answering. Former pro-golfer Roe called himself Mark James or Steve Ryder, while Tony posed as a legal expert from Robert Conroy Associates. After the trio pleaded guilty to fraudulent trading in 2000, Gary was jailed for 27 months, Tony for 21 months and Roe 27 months, plus another six for an unconnected fraud. MASSING-SCAM 3 After his prosecution, Massingham changed his surname to Moore - we wonder why - and took over struggling electronics firm Global Sourcing Technologies, back in 2008. He hired "Tony Murphy" as an accountant and advertised flatscreen TVs for sale before Christmas. The TVs failed to turn up and some victims even found their cards had been charged several times. Massingham/Moore then promptly vanished, leaving the firm with debts of more than pounds 1.5million, including pounds 500,000 worth of new trucks that disappeared too. When we confronted man-mountain Massingham, 43, outside his rented home in Milton Keynes, he told us: "It's all legal so I can't say nothing." He first denied then admitted he'd been arrested, it turned out for the alleged theft of the missing trucks. "Come back and see me once it's all been sorted out," he offered. We've recently found out that the charges have been dropped. We'd love to pop round for a chat with Gary but it seems he's moved on - along with his entourage with their expensive cars and young Thai women. It seems Gary had stopped paying his rent after moving in, another of his nasty habits. When one landlord finally got the Massingham gang evicted after six months without rent, the house was trashed and the locks filled with glue. Beware of this fraudster. (c) 2011 ProQuest Information and Learning Company; All Rights Reserved. |