Woman in $500k scam walks free

A MOTHER of four “duped” by an overseas crime gang into laundering almost half-a-million dollars through Darling Downs banks to overseas bank accounts has avoided actual jail time.

Patricia May Reid told police she had become involved in the scam after being contacted through Facebook by someone purporting to be a Facebook executive who told her she had won $50,000.

However, to obtain her “winnings” she had to forward her bank account details, Toowoomba District Court heard.

Commonwealth prosecutor Kate Milbourne told the court Reid’s bank details had been forwarded to a company aligned to the mining industry under the guise of being a sub-contractor and advising that the bank account details had been changed.

On July 29, last year, the company placed $645,037 into Reid’s bank account under the mistaken belief the money was for the sub-contractor.

Reid had then started making cash withdrawals ranging from $300 to $10,000 at various banks in Toowoomba, Miles, Chinchilla, Charleville and northern New South Wales totalling $53,000.

The 50-year-old had also made five telegraphic transfers totalling $411,582 to bank accounts in the United States, The Netherlands and Turkey ranging in value from $54,000 to $138,000, Ms Milbourne said.

Another $7128 had been transferred by Western Union to USA and Nigerian accounts.

Total amount dealt with by Reid had been $471,711.

The offending was detected in September last year when the complainant company found the money had not gone to the sub-contractor at all.

Ms Milbourne told the court about $180,000 left in the account had been returned to the complainant company with the other lost money subject to an insurance claim.

Reid pleaded guilty to dealing in proceeds of crime of more than $100,000.

Her barrister Dan Caruana told the court his client was born in New South Wales but had moved to Miles with her four children in 2015 to get away from a violent former partner.

She had no family support in Miles and had been caught at a low point in her life and fell victim to the scammers who promised her $30,000.

While jail was within range, his client’s four children needed her at home in particular one child with special needs, Mr Caruana said.

Judge Michael Shanahan said the impact Reid’s incarceration would have on her children was a significant factor.

“You were used as a ‘dupe’ or ‘tool’ by an overseas crime syndicate,” Judge Shanahan told her.

“It appears you were taken advantage of.”

He accepted Reid had not benefitted financially from the offending.

Finding her role as “unsophisticated” and that she was bound to be caught, Judge Shanahan sentenced Reid to 30 months in jail but ordered she be released immediately upon entering into a recognisance of $2000 to be of good behaviour for three years and to submit to a two-year probation order.