The woman who tracked down her scammer

Sam Hawley: We all get them, the annoying scam emails, texts and phone calls. And we know, as the scammers get more sophisticated, many Australians are losing their hard-earned money to them. But now we’re going to bring you the story of one brave woman who lost everything and fought back with Consumer Affairs reporter Michael Atkin. I’m Sam Hawley on Gadigal land in Sydney. This is ABC News Daily. Michael, we spoke to you quite recently about how Australians are losing billions of dollars to scams and just how sophisticated the scams are actually becoming. And now I want to talk to you again because you have this fascinating story about one woman who’s sort of taken matters into her own hands. She’s actually tracked down one of her accused scammers. So tell me about Jo, because she’s rather inspiring.

Michael Atkin: Yes. So Jo O’Brien, she lives in Melbourne. And what’s remarkable about her is she’s done what I think most scam victims fantasise about and tried to go after some of the people she believes could be responsible. She was tricked into paying half a million dollars to an investment scam. And this money, it came from her divorce settlement. It was her life savings. She thought she was doing exactly the right thing by picking a savings investment account where the money would safely go into that and grow for her retirement.

Jo O’Brien: Obviously I was thinking positive and I was thinking I’m moving forward, I’m doing the right thing. And it was going to be peachy from here, but it’s not really what happened. The opposite happened.

Michael Atkin: And instead she was tricked and this scam was sophisticated. They pretended to be financial giant AMP and they even pretended to be real people who work for AMP. And they had a fake website that offered comparison rates and things like that. And they would talk to you carefully about what’s involved, send you real documentation that appears to come directly from AMP, but modify it for themselves. And she thought she was paying the money into a bank account that had been set up for herself. But really, really she was paying the money into the bank account of a tiny Victorian company she’d never heard of before, which is called Supercheap Security. And the money went into that account before it was allegedly laundered offshore. And she’s not alone. There’s nine people in total who have complained to Victoria Police about paying $1.7 million into the bank account of this tiny company before it’s been lost offshore. She’s done many things to try and work out what’s happened, but there is a man who owns this company. He’s a fairly young Pakistani man who’s been living in Melbourne and she came across his phone number and she started texting him.

Jo O’Brien : So yeah, I just text him saying, I know that you’re pretending to be in Dubai. I know that you’re in Australia. Give me back my money or, you know, I’m going to tell the police your phone number and they’ll ping you and they’ll find you. And we sort of started from there.

Michael Atkin: She wrote to him and said she wouldn’t give up trying to get her money back until she ruined his life or she was repaid.

Sam Hawley: Wow. Okay. So she’s not messing around. Good on her. Right. So she’s texting this man. And what sort of reaction is she getting from him?

Michael Atkin: So she went in hard. She said she was going to keep coming after him. She had hired a private investigator who’d tracked down his family in Pakistan and threatened to tell them and expose his involvement in this alleged scam. And she also said she had a connection in Pakistani intelligence. Now, those things aren’t exactly true, but she says she does have people in Pakistan helping her. And he wrote back to warn her, basically, to say, if you reach my family in Dubai or Pakistan, you won’t be getting a penny back. And he also taunted her. He said, I’m safe. There’s no charges against me, no criminal charges. And he also said he had connections in Melbourne and Brisbane that could host her very well. Now, it’s unclear what that means, but she took that as a threat that she reported to police.

Sam Hawley: Amazing that she’s actually corresponding with this man. How did she actually track him down? Who is this person? What do we know about him?

Michael Atkin: So, Muhammad Ali Waheed, he’s a 29-year-old. He’s Pakistani born, from Lahore. And, well, he’s available on company records. So I tracked him down too. And, you know, she is engaged in a civil lawsuit against the company. And so she has a lot of details about the company from that. He’s the director of this tiny Melbourne company. And in her lawsuit, she alleges it’s a sham company that has never actually operated. And that it was set up for the purpose of perpetuating this fraud. Now, that’s disputed by him and another person who founded this company. But the evidence there is sparse or contested. And investigations are ongoing into that. She made a formal complaint to police, as did many other victims when this first happened. And they investigated and they say that Muhammad Ali Waheed remains a person of interest. And she said she called Victoria Police a number of times and they didn’t get back to her. And so she’s concerned that potentially they didn’t follow up on that information. Although we don’t know that.

Jo O’Brien : I used to think the police were here to help us. I honestly believed it. But now I don’t believe it anymore. I think that real crimes are being committed and they honestly felt to me like they didn’t care less.

Sam Hawley: Okay, so she’s concerned that police aren’t following up as much as she’d like them to. So she has, as you say, she’s taken matters into her own hands. And she’s got all this information about this guy. And she keeps talking to him, doesn’t she?

Michael Atkin: Yes, and the conversation is remarkable in that it swings wildly. You know, it goes from being, you know, the opening exchanges were threatening from both of them. And she admits she threatened him. I mean, she’s not pretending that she didn’t do that.

Jo O’Brien : Yes, I threatened him, but I couldn’t care less because he’s in the wrong and I’m in the right. That’s the way I see it. I’m just trying to get back what’s mine.

Michael Atkin: But then she changes tact, she waters down her tone, she’s quite soft with him. And then he becomes quite empathetic with her. And he says that, you know, all of this has wrecked his life too, that he’s been trapped as well. Because he alleges that actually he’s been caught in the middle here, that he agreed to allow the bank account for the company to be used by somebody who’s overseas. This shadowy overseas crime figure. But he says he’s going to help her track this guy down. And so says, I’ll give you all his details. But when the information comes through and the messages, they’re pretty vague. There’s a pin drop on a map showing a location in Dubai, a Dubai mobile number, photos of a house. Probably the biggest thing is there’s no real proof that this guy was involved at all.

Sam Hawley: Mm, right. And Michael, you’ve actually spoken to Waheed.

Michael Atkin: Yes, back in March, he agreed to do an interview with me somewhat surprisingly.

Sam Hawley: Yes, I would have thought so.

Michael Atkin: Yeah. And so he said, we’ll do a video interview with you. And so he appeared on this video meeting software and showed up.

Muhammad Ali Waheed: Hello, can you hear me?

Michael Atkin: Yes, I can. Yes. So this is Mr. Waheed, Mr. Muhammad Ali Waheed.

Muhammad Ali Waheed: Yes.

Michael Atkin: And you’re based in Dubai now?

Muhammad Ali Waheed: I would like to pass this question. Due to the security reasons, I won’t be able to tell you that where am I…

Michael Atkin: He was wearing a football hoodie with an American NFL brand on the top. He was wearing aviator sunglasses and a COVID mask trying to hide his identity. Probably the most stunning thing from that interview, and it really is a remarkable interview, he admitted he had broken the law. However, he denied knowing about the elaborate scam at the time and only later found out about it.

Michael Atkin: I put to you that you actually knew far more about this than you’re letting on, and you’re painting a very small role for yourself when really you’ve been central to this fraud.

Muhammad Ali Waheed: If I would have been involved in this, like I knew like even a single thing more. And if I knew like if I had a small hint about this scam, I would never do it…

Sam Hawley: Yeah, well, Jo, of course, is still on the hunt. So she also came up with more information. She figured out who had actually set up the original bank account, didn’t she?

Michael Atkin: Yes. So the company founder of Supercheap Security is actually another man. He’s also Pakistani and lives in Melbourne. His name is Hassan Mehdi. She decided to go to where the company listed as the headquarters, and she thought this would be Hassan Mehdi’s house. Actually, when she knocked on the door, it wasn’t Hassan Mehdi that answered. It was another man. At first, the man told her that she was, you know, mistaken, that she was at the wrong place. But then he said, oh, actually, I know what you’re talking about. And another man came out and said, you know, Hassan isn’t here, but, you know, can I pass a message? And she got a bit scared. I think she probably second guessed exactly the wisdom of what she was doing by herself there at this house and left immediately. And I think what’s remarkable about this story is that Victoria Police did actually make an arrest. So Hassan Mehdi tried to leave the country and Victoria Police arrested him. He was detained at the airport and then he was later charged with eight counts of obtaining property by deception in connection with this scam. But he denies he had any involvement. And, you know, I think what’s crucial here is Victoria Police have told me that, well, at the moment, we can’t prove that a particular crime has been committed in Victoria. So we’ve passed on information about alleged offending overseas to foreign law enforcement partners by using the AFP and Interpol. And, you know, if we get further information about crimes committed, and this is crucial in Victoria, we can reopen the investigation.

Sam Hawley: So the police just don’t have the powers or the right powers here?

Michael Atkin: I think they have a lot of powers. And people have put to me that, you know, there has to be a lot of caution taken with which charges are laid against which person. And at the moment, there’s nothing. So, you know, Muhammad Ali Waheed, he’s not been charged with anything. Hassan Mehdi was charged, but those charges have been dropped by police. It is really difficult. And I think it goes to the question as to whether the powers and scope and resourcing, crucially, of police and of ASIC and other bodies are adequate for the threat we now face.

Sam Hawley: And so tell me then, Michael, what about Jo? I feel like we’re all behind her. I’m not sure that police would advocate the methods that she’s using. But, you know, we all feel for Jo. So is she going to be able to get this money back? Because it’s so much money.

Michael Atkin: I think that remains to be seen. But my reporting would indicate that the track record of victims getting their money back, you know, shows that it’s unlikely in almost all circumstances. But I guess there’s an important question about who may pay and under what circumstances. So she is suing the company, Supercheap Security. She’s also pursuing a complaint against her bank, the Commonwealth Bank, before the financial ombudsman, AFCA. And so that remains ongoing. But Commonwealth Bank has not offered her any money at this stage.

Sam Hawley: All right, well, go Jo, because I think we’ve all had enough of this scamming at this point. Michael, thank you so much.

Michael Atkin: Thank you.

Sam Hawley: Michael Atkin is the ABC’s Consumer Affairs Reporter. This episode was produced by Bridget Fitzgerald and Jess O’Callaghan. Audio production by Sam Dunn. Our supervising producer is David Coady. I’m Sam Hawley. Thanks for listening.