The noose is gradually tightening around the authors of the "
false president scams
": three Franco-Israelis, suspected of fraud in false transfers that caused more than a million euros in damage, are now in the hands of the French justice.
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Notably, two of them were extradited on December 7 by Israel, which until recently categorically refused to send its nationals to be held accountable before the courts of other countries. The third was arrested in June 2021 at Roissy-Charles-de-Gaulle airport, after a stay of a few days in Paris.
The three men are suspected of having together defrauded or attempted to defraud companies as well as individuals by the means of “
scams with false transfers
” or “
scams with the false president
” during the period of the first confinement.
The principle of these scams, which appeared in the 2010s and have largely developed thanks to the Internet, is simple: concerning companies, a usurper passes himself on the phone or by email for the boss to his employees and their request for discreetly transfer money to accounts abroad.
The transferred funds then quickly disappear into offshore accounts.
150 companies victims of attempted fraud
Concerning individuals, criminals pass themselves off as bankers or other financial professionals and tout high-yield investments. In this case involving the three men, 150 companies were victims of attempted fraud and 43 individuals were swindled across French territory, Colonel Jean-Paul Douvier, head of the Reims Research Section, told AFP. in charge of investigations. The cumulative loss is estimated at 1.1 million euros over four months.
Among the companies targeted, there is a purchasing center for a supermarket chain, which foiled the attempted fraud and lodged a complaint.
The company's human resources director had been contacted by a person claiming to work in the Public Treasury and intervene in the context of VAT deferrals provided for by government aid for the Covid-19 crisis.
On the individual side, the fraudsters had notably convinced to invest in parking spaces in Europe or even medical research projects, in particular for the Covid-19.
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The investigations, launched in April 2020 by the court of Châlons-en-Champagne (Marne), where one of the first frauds was committed, quickly determined that the suspects were in Israel. In the process, two men residing in a city north of Tel Aviv are arrested by the Israeli judicial authorities who have opened a "
mirror investigation
". First imprisoned in Israel, they then wear an electronic bracelet. One of them recognizes part of the facts.
In June of the same year, another man was arrested as he was about to return to Israel, after spending a few days in Paris.
Owner of an exchange office, he is suspected of having laundered the extorted sums.
Indicted for "
organized gang fraud
", "
organized gang money laundering
" and "
criminal conspiracy
" and placed in pre-trial detention, he disputes the facts during his interrogations.
Rare extraditions
Almost a year and a half later, on December 7, 2021, Israel extradites the other two suspects to France, where they are also indicted by a Parisian judge of the National Jurisdiction against Organized Crime (Junalco), to whom the investigation was sent in view of the complexity of the investigations to be carried out abroad. One of them is imprisoned and the other placed under judicial supervision. "
It is nevertheless quite rare to have extraditions of the accused
", underlines Colonel Douvier, who welcomes "
very good cooperation
" at the level of investigation and justice with the Israeli authorities.
"
Classically the difficulty in this kind of investigation is to convince the authorities of the country concerned to be able to act quickly
," he explains.
However, "
the question of time is important before these crooks disappear in the wild or move on to other things
."
One of the two extradited men tried to challenge his extradition before the French courts, arguing in particular that he should first have been summoned to his address in Israel before being arrested.
Ruled admissible, his request was however rejected by the Paris Court of Appeal.
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For Me Philippe Ohayon, one of the suspect's lawyers, the fact that the Court of Appeal found the request admissible and examined it is, however, "
a step forward
", a sign of "
increasingly thorough control of judges on extradition requests
”.
For the lawyer, "
you have to think twice before requesting extradition
", because it involves the risk of prolonged detention, sometimes unjustified, due to the cumbersome of the procedure.
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