A Bermuda company has been at the centre cracking a global telemarketing fraud scheme which saw pensioners lose millions of dollars in a scam that lasted over a year and a half.

First Atlantic Commerce (FAC) became aware that four companies were running suspicious activity through its credit card payment processing system and called in the fraud squad.

The companies tried to process $22 million through Bermuda before their accounts were frozen, and it was revealed that authorities in both the United States, including the FBI, and in Canada had been tracking the crooks - but had never managed to catch them.

"We got so involved on the evidence side, because they were relying on our evidence to be able to put these people behind bars," said FAC's CEO Andrea Wilson. "I had a corporate obligation to be involved. I couldn't walk away, I didn't want to walk away, I wanted to make sure there was an end to this."

The scheme defrauded US pensioners by selling fake British National Savings Premium Bonds under the pretence that investors would receive a legitimate investment product, when in fact Premium Bonds had not authorised any company to sell their product and in fact cannot be purchased or held in trust by a third party.

Canadian and US authorities had been on the trail of the fraudsters, but they had eluded them for 18 months, because they set up shop so quickly, then disappeared without a trace.

But they made a mistake in Bermuda, where the ring leader, Tim Babuin, for the first time used his real name, and FAC were switched on to his scam within six weeks - two weeks before he would normally pull out and disappear.

Last month on June 16, Babuin, director of Canadian company Nagg Holdings Ltd., went before a judge in the US and was sentenced to eight years in jail.

Mrs. Wilson told The Royal Gazette she had been helping the Canadian and US authorities for the past three years, and had received threats while she co-operated with them.

"His strategy was to do processing for eight weeks, and then up and leave, and do eight weeks somewhere else and then up and leave," said Mrs. Wilson. "Here they got six weeks. Normally it would take eight weeks before anyone worked out what was happening."

The cross-border investigation included the FBI and Mrs. Wilson as the prime defence witness for the US Government in the case. In the end she did not have to appear in court as he plea-bargained his way out of a 17 year sentence - and only got eight years in jail.

"They (the scammers) were in and out," said Mrs. Wilson. "But we were smart enough to freeze their accounts before they realised, before they knew that we knew."

"We knew where the money had gone, we just didn't know how much was there," she said. "And of course within a few days we knew that they knew we had an injunction on their accounts, because I was subject to a number of threatening phone calls and e-mails, that were really abusive, very abusive.

"It was very scary. I was frightened definitely. I did not know who I was up against."

But now Babuin is behind bars, and police recovered $15 million from the gang of fraudsters, according to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

See Friday Focus on Page 27