Elderly father duped into £25k debt by scam company Marks Art: TONY HETHERINGTON finds culprit in Cyprus

Tony Hetherington is Monetary Mail on Sunday’s ace investigator, preventing readers corners, revealing the reality that lies behind closed doorways and profitable victories for many who have been left out-of-pocket. Learn how to contact him under. 

Ms F.M. writes: My father, in his late 80s, has artwork apparently price about £78,000, bought from Marks Artwork. 

Final yr he was duped into paying greater than £25,000 in charges linked to a promised sale. 

He was instructed to pay VAT, then insurance coverage prices, then financial institution costs, and eventually he was instructed the deal fell via. 

Tony Hetherington replies: Marks Artwork was a rip-off once I first warned towards it final September. And it’s nonetheless a rip-off at the moment. 

Its web site boasts: ‘Since early 2017, we have been the pioneers of innovation, setting a golden commonplace for artists, traders, and galleries alike.’ Not unhealthy for an funding enterprise whose accounts present it was dormant till 2020.

However the lies instructed to victims are worse. Marks Artwork issued cast media studies – stated to be from the BBC and the Day by day Telegraph – praising a girl artist nicknamed ‘Mrs Banksy’, and your father, Mr W, invested £15,520.

Mark Steven Smith, who owns the rip-off firm, protested that he had been given the forgeries by another person. I instructed him level clean that this didn’t give him the appropriate to revenue from fraud, and he returned your father’s £15,520.

This was only one small a part of your father’s losses although. He paid £7,500 to Artwork Retailer and Insure Restricted so his footage could be secure. But this enterprise instructed Corporations Home it was not buying and selling. 

I ponder whether it instructed the tax man the identical factor. The corporate was compulsorily struck off final yr. Who owned it? Shock, shock – it was Mark Steven Smith.

Below stress from Marks Artwork, your father ended up deeply in debt. You appealed to the banks and card issuers he used to pay Marks Artwork. They had been Lloyds Financial institution and M&S Financial institution, so I contacted them and supplied proof that the artwork firm cheats its traders.

This can not have been a simple investigation for both financial institution. They needed to determine whether or not your father had been cheated over each separate buy. However the refunds started to stream. Lloyds had already determined to refund greater than £13,000, it stated, after which it went additional and repaid virtually £3,000 for 2 artwork purchases made way back to 2018.

M&S Financial institution instructed me it regarded into 18 transactions. 4 latest offers had been refunded beneath chargeback guidelines. The remaining have since been investigated beneath the Part 75 client safety rule and your father has been repaid in full aside from one buy which sadly exceeded the £30,000 allowed by Part 75.

Lloyds discovered some funds went to different firms related to Smith. Though chargeback guidelines didn’t apply, the financial institution generously repaid an additional £27,500 as a gesture of goodwill. It instructed me: ‘Protecting our prospects secure from fraud is our precedence and we have now an excessive amount of sympathy for Mr W because the sufferer of a rip-off.’

You instructed me: ‘I actually cannot thanks sufficient for all you’re doing. Dad turned 89 this week and handled himself to a brand new listening to assist. He has been capable of clear all his money owed, and has some left over to maintain within the financial institution. The distinction this has made to him is difficult to place into phrases.’

One closing level. Once I first sounded the alarm, I reported that Marks Artwork was recruiting a phone gross sales staff, providing earnings totalling £120,000. The roles had been in Northern Cyprus, and Smith defined: ‘The hotter local weather and decrease bills make it extra engaging than the costs and climate in London.’

Now although, I can reveal the actual purpose for Smith’s alternative of location.

In the meantime… 

Mark Steven Smith is a needed man. Not for the artwork fraud he runs, however for doing a runner from a court docket listening to which sentenced him to 4 years in jail. I traced him to a village referred to as Incesu within the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.

In March 2017, he was driving his Vary Rover on the M25 in Surrey when it was in a minor collision with a Renault Clio. Minutes later, the Vary Rover stopped at site visitors lights on an exit slip street. A lady passenger obtained out of a Mercedes which was additionally on the lights, and studies say there was an argument in regards to the earlier collision.

The Vary Rover then hit the girl and drove away. She was taken to hospital with a number of damaged ribs, a fractured shoulder and an damage to her leg. Police later arrested Mark Steven Smith for offences together with driving whereas disqualified, driving whereas uninsured and failing to cease after an accident.

In June 2018, Smith was convicted at Kingston Crown Court docket of inflicting severe damage by harmful driving. He failed to look for sentencing, and was given a four-year jail time period in his absence. Victims of his artwork rip-off say they’ve been contacted by police in London who’re investigating Marks Artwork. 

And police in Surrey need him so he can start 4 years behind bars. Smith himself instructed me: ‘Tony, this was not me. I had nothing to do with this. I actually and my staff have researched it. Appears there may be one other Mark Smith with this offence.’

Properly, here’s a police custody image of Mark Steven Smith the harmful driver. He’s from the identical space as Mark Steven Smith the artwork fraudster. And so they share the identical date of beginning. What are the percentages?

The UK has no extradition treaty with Northern Cyprus, although the authorities there might kick Smith out. Or he might get on a airplane and return to England. I am going to meet him on the airport, and I’m positive Surrey Police could be glad to attend. If the police have gotten the mistaken man, I am going to even write the headline myself: Artwork Fraudster Framed. How about it, Mark?

In case you imagine you’re the sufferer of monetary wrongdoing, write to Tony Hetherington at Monetary Mail, 9 Derry Avenue, London W8 5HY or e mail tony.hetherington@mailonsunday.co.uk. Due to the excessive quantity of enquiries, private replies can’t be given. Please ship solely copies of authentic paperwork, which we remorse can’t be returned.