A Cautionary Tale.....watch out for fraudsters.....

[Edward Imp]

Hello to all.

 

I am about to impart a rather unfortunate experience. I have considered this carefully before posting it, and I intend to keep the perpetrators identity secret for the time being because he is an active member of these forums but some of my friends here may still be involved with litigation to have monies returned to them so consider this a general 'WARNING'.

 

I have only recently joined this forum, and it has proved really useful. I have made a couple of new friends and as you would expect in our community they are decent blokes, and good shooting people.

 

In some ways, because we all expect each other to be basically 'alright' we may on occasions leave ourselves open to schoolboy errors. Unfortunately in all walks of life there are rogues, criminals, fraudsters and just generally bad types.

 

This tale is about me, making a ridiculous schoolboy error, and paying dearly for it, along with about 11 other unfortunate souls. I would not normally be 'caught out' by anyone. I am not that old or very young, (46) I am well-travelled, (I work in Asia, Africa and Europe) I consider myself to have a reasonable level of education and I have been involved with upsetting criminal activities on many occasions in my career. So, this should NOT have happened to me! Please let me explain.

 

Having moved recently to a new area where I knew no one, i decided to join this forum to make a few friends and hopefully find a little bit of shooting. Nothing fancy, just a few acres, sufficient to enjoy my chosen sport. Because I don’t know anyone, I decided that I was happy to pay a reasonable sum to secure some rights. I just needed it to be within 50 miles of me, and have pigeons flying over it!

 

I was delighted when I saw an advertisement in the 'Shooting Available-Paid for' section of the site. It was close enough, the area promised hundreds of woodies, and the price seemed fine. I duly contacted the chap, via this site to set up a meeting. I met with the gentleman concerned along with two other guys at the entrance to some cut rape in a pleasant location. The guy we met seemed extremely plausible. He had printed some rudimentary maps, he was confident enough to enter the land with us, even allowing one of the guns to carry a loaded weapon in case an unfortunate creature should raise its head! We walked the land. It all seemed perfect, multiple crops, great hedge rows, there were pigeons around and evidence of rabbits etc. Our host talked expansively about how many woodies we would shoot, he explained that we would never see anyone as the land was private and he also said that he had bought and paid for the shooting rights on the land. He went on, very convincingly about the syndicate meetings we would have, how we would record the game shot, and even discussed the working parties required to convert two small bomb holes into flight ponds; putting some ducks down and so on.

 

Once we had concluded the initial meet, and knowing that spaces were limited, we retired to the entrance of the land and money changed hands. We all committed there and then, in cash. This chap went home with his pockets bulging with 20 pound notes, easily more than 1000 pounds, and that was just three of us.

 

In return all he asked was that we text him to say when we would be shooting. As any self-respecting Meerkat would say- ‘Simples’.

 

Now, at this point you will all be asking- 'Why didn’t you ask for proof?' 'Did you meet the land owner' 'Did you get a receipt?' and so on, and you would of course be right to do so. In my defence, (and it’s a very poor defence) I simply put my trust in this character because everything seemed so plausible. It often is when fraud is involved; part of the craft of the fraudster is to show total confidence. I was taken in hook, line and sinker; this was because I have always had an innate confidence in all those within our community. I simply thought it would be impossible to get ripped off. Foolish boy.

 

Anyway, I will try and cut this story down and get to the key points without boring you all with too much detail.

 

I began to shoot over the land within a few days, I even invested in a shiny new semi auto to do so! My first surprise came when I realised that people were walking just a few feet behind my hide, and on investigation I discovered a busy public footpath dissecting the land! This had not been mentioned! I also noticed people walking dogs all over the place as well. Some guy even came and knocked on my hide accompanied by a gaggle of dogs to see If I would let him have some pigeons! Obviously I changed positions, and did my best to keep an eye open for wandering dog walkers and other locals!

 

The alarm bells had started ringing because I had specifically asked about walkers only to be assured there were virtually 'none'. I don’t like shooting when people arrive unexpectedly, I am fanatical about safety. On my second outing I noticed a 4 X 4 on the land and assumed it was another syndicate member, I had met a few other guns by this time. Unfortunately it was not another syndicate member, it was the actual person with shooting rights on the land. A relative of the land owner and farmer. In effect, I was unceremoniously thrown off the permission. To be fair to the guy he was pretty decent about the whole thing and even showed a degree of sympathy, but it was clear that he had no knowledge of a syndicate on his land. Serious alarm bells now.

 

Anyway, clearly there was a problem. Communication from the guy we had met in the field before stopped abruptly, texts went unanswered and he became somewhat elusive. I had the hump by now as clearly I was severely out of pocket and this chump was sitting pretty with a large piece of my hard won cash. A situation that I could not allow to prevail.

 

Fortunately, I have the means to track down jokers like this and I quickly located his place of work, his partner’s details, and of course exactly where he lived.

 

In order to get my money back, I started by contacting him by text and phone, all of which went un-answered. I was now deafened by the alarm bells, and quickly realised that I had been done. I had been prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt. Mistakes and misunderstandings can happen, even on this monumental scale. It could have been fixed in a matter of moments if it had been a genuine error, as he would have simply said sorry, and given me and the other syndicate members our cash back.

 

Once I realised that he was not responding I wrote to him by recorded delivery and in polite but firm terms outlined my proposed course of action. This included the option to refund me in full within 7 days, or court action would follow. As expected he did not respond. I also mentioned that whilst I considered that at present he had made an error, if he was unable to convince me otherwise it would be a matter of reporting him for 'obtaining money by deception' a serious criminal offence carrying a jail term, an early morning visit from the rozzers, and confiscation of all of his weapons and licences, something that seemed a little harsh, but hell, this bloke had my cash, and no one gets one over on me!

 

Obviously I recieved no response from him whatsoever. He may have been under the impression that I would just go away as the actual sum of money was not life changing but there is a very serious principle here. At that point I issued a claim against him through the small claims court. No evidence is required at this stage, so it’s simple and cheap to do. The costs would be down to him and I added a percentage of interest on my money and a daily charge of £1 until he settled. He also ignored this.

 

Once the initial time was up I texted him pointing out that in addition to my claim, which was becoming more expensive for him each day (but was merely a civil matter in any case) I would be forced to report him for the criminal offence outlined in a previous paragraph. Not unsurprisingly his partner paid the amount owed directly into my account that day.

I should point out that if someone does not defend the claim, and judgement is made against them, the judgement is easily enforced by a high court order and is toe-curlingly embarrassing for the individual concerned, and of course they pick up the tab. Win win!

 

So for me the matter was over, my money and costs had been returned, but only after a fair bit of messing about, during which time I could have been shooting wood pigeons.

 

So, here’s a few things to consider when paying for rough shooting…….

 

1. Don’t rush into anything.
2. Ask to meet the land owner, he will have final say on who can shoot and they must be on board.
3. Don’t pay cash if you can avoid it. There is no paper trail, and it can be considered money laundering if the amounts are high enough.
4. Talk to some locals if you can.
5. Return to the proposed permission on you own at another time so you can form your own opinion.
6. Get a signed agreement.
7. Talk to other syndicate members.
8. Make sure they are asking you the correct questions- Have you got insurance? Shotgun/FAC certificate?
9. Ask them to show you the lease they own for the shooting rights.
10. Get a list of other syndicate members numbers.

There are probably other things you need to do as well, but this will be my personal check list in the future.

 

This guy has stolen nearly £4000. It should obviously not be allowed to happen. Much of that money remains owed to other syndicate members on this date. They will all get their money back, I will see to that.

 

Finally, think about the implications this could have had with the rozzers? We know that some police officers are less than sympathetic with anyone who has the temerity to legitimately own a firearm, so catching you or I wandering around with a loaded weapon somewhere we are manifestly not allowed to be would be a great notch on some coppers wall of fame. The outcome would be bad in so many ways.

 

Anyway, that’s the end of this morning’s sermon, I hope that it is of some help to anyone buying a permission.

 

[Edward Imp]

Its important at this stage not to personally identify him. I would politely ask that we keep speculation to a minimum and concentrate on stopping others getting caught out.

 

 

Believe me, he is currently no threat to anyone, he will have other things on his mind for the time being.

[Edward Imp]

Name him so no one else gets stung and he can be banned.

I understand your sentiments, however we are not here to sit as judge and jury and besides as I have been very clear about other litigation that may be in process, so stop worrying about his identity or getting him banned, it may cause him to go to ground or stop others getting their money back.....

 

I apprecaite your understanding and cooperation!

[Cranfield]

This thread has been locked and some posts removed, as external events may be prejudiced by further comment.