Australia's largest ever individual fraud committed by a Tamil woman!

Revenge in riches - scorned finance worker Rajina Subramaniam helped herself to $45 million

Haul ... alleged serial fraudster Rajina Subramaniam / Pic: Adam Taylor Source: The Daily Telegraph

RAJINA Subramaniam was a dutiful employee of the financial group ING for 20 years, but her belief that she was "abused" in the workplace turned her loyalty into resentment and a quest for revenge, a court was told yesterday.

Not content with a small-scale operation to get back at her bosses, the Castle Hill woman undertook one of the country's largest ever individual fraud operations - and netted more than $45 million to spend on a cache of designer items.

The extent of Subramaniam's five-year scheme was revealed in Central Local Court yesterday, when she pleaded guilty to 26 fraud charges.

The immense size of the deceit was matched only by the range of clothing, jewellery and cosmetics she purchased from designers including Chanel, Hugo Boss, Tiffany and Paspaley Pearls. The spending spree also included eight apartments at Bondi Beach, Kirribilli and the city, the court was told.

Documents before the court state that Subramaniam, in her role as a senior accounts manager, had access to ING's online banking system and could use two identities that enabled her to "generate the illegal transfers" with plausible labels.

In total, more than $11 million was siphoned from ING accounts and paid to a range of top designers, with documents revealing Subramaniam achieved "VIP customer status" at Paspaley, Chanel and Hugo Boss "as an extremely wealthy customer".

She was arrested after representatives from Paspaley informed ING of a $2.5 million payment from her to buy diamonds at a coming auction, documents say.

During a police raid at her office, boxes filled with "extremely delicate jewellery" were found, including a 6.6 carat diamond ring from Bvlgari.

The court heard that more than 600 pieces of jewellery, a 900ml bottle of Chanel No.5 perfume, 20 pieces of Swarovski crystal and a 1500ml bottle of vintage Dom Perignon champagne were in her haul.

As a reason for her behaviour, documents reveal Subramaniam claimed she had been abused in the workplace "and had a lot of revenge and resentment towards ING".

She will face the District Court on July 1, when a date will be set for sentencing.

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/sydney-nsw/revenge-in-riches-scorned-finance-worker-rajina-subramaniam-helped-herself-to-45-million/story-e6freuzi-1226080921474

Debit-card ring may be linked to Tamil terrorists

A routine traffic stop this week has unravelled an international debit card fraud ring, has led to 373 criminal charges and possibly has broken up a Tamil Tiger terrorist fundraising and money laundering operation, police said Wednesday.

TORONTO- A routine traffic stop this week has unravelled an international debit card fraud ring, has led to 373 criminal charges and possibly has broken up a Tamil Tiger terrorist fundraising and money laundering operation, police said Wednesday.

All because four men ran a stop sign in a Scarborough, Ont., last Monday, Det. Peter Trimble said.

"That's not too smart a thing to do when you're driving a van full of stolen bank cards," he said. "And they had been drinking and had open liquor in the car, which also isn't very smart."

Constables Scott Aikman and Patrick Pelo saw the rented van cruise through a stop sign and pulled up behind them in his cruiser, his lights flashing. That is when the officers noticed one of the four men inside frantically trying to hide something in the back of the van.

When the van finally stopped, the two constables realized immediately the driver had been drinking and there was open liquor in the vehicle. "That gave them the right to search the vehicle, which they did, and found a number of plastic gift cards," said Trimble

Those cards later proved to have debit card information on the magnetic strip on the back, which police believe was stolen from bank customers in the United Kingdom. All four were arrested and another such card was found in one of their wallets.

Police later searched a hotel and a home and found another 88 cards, all with debit card data from British banks on their magnetic strips, as well as $25,000 in Canadian $20 bills, laptop computers and memory sticks, receipts for money transfers to the U.K., travel documents and passports and what detectives described as "Tamil Tiger paraphernalia."

But Trimble could not confirm the bank card fraud ring was tied to the Tamil Tigers, formally known as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, which is officially listed as a terrorist organization by the Canadian government, but is believed to be continuing fund-raising activities here through various front organizations.

"Is there a huge global conspiracy behind this? It's too early in the investigation to confirm anything like that," he said. "But there is clearly an international connection."

John Thompson, the executive director of the Mackenzie Institute, said the debit-card ring has all the hallmarks of a Tamil Tiger fund-raising operation. "This is the new standard in how terrorist groups fund themselves," he said. "It's the fastest-growing area of crime in the world and it's not going to go away anytime soon."

Thompson said similar operations have been broken up by police in the past, including one in 1993 when 18 men were arrested for skimming debit cards from customers at a Toronto gas station. "Supporters of the Tamil Tigers have been doing this in Canada for at least the last 10 years."

Trimble said the cards seized were worth an estimated $250,000. The data on them had been "skimmed" from British bank card users, likely through a debit machine rigged to record their cards' electronic signature and a small camera positioned to record the bank users' PIN number. Police also found card-reading hardware and a pinhole camera during their searches of the home and the hotel.

Two of those arrested are from London, England, and Toronto police have contacted Interpol, said Trimble.

Pratheepan Thambu, 22, Lojanand Srianandan, 27, both of Toronto, Sethukavalar Saravanabavan, 35, and Kirubakaran Selvanayagam Pillai, 38, both of London, U.K., each face 41 charges of fraudulent possession of credit card data; 41 charges of possession of property obtained by crime; and one of participating in a criminal organization. Pillai faces an additional 41 charges of fraudulent possession of credit card data.

They are scheduled to appear in court on Friday.

National Post

© (c) CanWest MediaWorks Publications Inc.

http://www.canada.com/topics/news/national/story.html?id=84b20bd7-ca6f-43a4-8ee8-0d368f899810

April 23, 2007

Petrol station scam ‘was masterminded by the Tamil Tigers’

Sean O’Neill

A massive credit card sting involving up to 200 British petrol stations was said yesterday to have been organised by Tamil Tiger terrorists.

Millions of pounds have been taken from credit and debit cards after their owners used them to pay for goods at petrol stations where “skimming” machinery had been fitted.

The guerrilla group was accused of defrauding British drivers to fund its campaign of violence against the Government of Sri Lanka.

Police are investigating incidents at about 200 independently owned petrol stations. The inquiries began in Hull and spread to Leeds, Liverpool, Edinburgh, Norfolk, Peterborough, Bristol and Nottingham.

The fraudsters used machinery to “skim” data from credit and debit cards, which was transferred to bogus cards.

Card details cloned in Britain have been used to obtain funds in Thailand. Police found that the common link was the involvement of Sri Lankan gangs.

Skimming has been used to raise money for Islamist terrorists in Algeria, Kashmir and Chechnya. But the Sri Lankan High Commission in London claimed that the latest fraud was the work of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).

The group renewed all-out attacks last year. Recent attacks have involved suicide bomb boats and bombs dropped from an aircraft on an air force base.

Maxwell Keegal, of the High Commission, said that terrorists lent asylum-seekers money to set up petrol stations and newsagents, then forced them to use skimming machines. “Often the LTTE will use threats against the people or their families in Sri Lanka,” he said. “We do not want the good name of the Sri Lankan people to be tarnished. I don’t want people to think all Sri Lankan shopkeepers are crooks.”

Humberside Police, which is investigating several reports of fraud, would not confirm a link with the Tamil Tigers.

There are about 175,000 Sri Lankans in Britain, the majority of them Tamils who have fled the fighting at home.

The Tamil Tigers have been waging a guerrilla war since the 1980s, seeking an independent Tamil state. Tamil terrorism is rooted in conflict between the Tamils, who are mostly Hindu, and the mainly Buddhist Sinhalese, who predominate in the Sri Lankan Government.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article1690415.ece

Two Tamils arrested in Paris over man’s death: Tiger infighting mounts in Europe

Two pro-LTTE activists were arrested in Paris on Friday following the death of Ramesh Sivarupan who is believed to be a member of the Ruthrakumar faction of the LTTE, according to informed sources.

The sources said that Ramesh Sivarupan was kidnapped and taken in a van from his residence in Paris and was found near his house a few days ago with injuries. He succumbed to injuries at a hospital in Paris on Thursday.

Thambiah Ganesh and Kuppilan Ravi, believed to be members of the Nediyavan group of the pro-LTTE faction have been taken into custody by the police in Paris in connection with the death of Sivarupan, sources said. Early last week, the Nediyavan faction burnt thousands of copies of Thainilam, a newspaper in Paris printed by its rival Ruthrakumar faction. The rivalry between the two factions had spread to several parts of Europe with the members of each faction looking for each other, the sources said.

According to sources, the conflict between the two factions sparked off following the annihilation of the LTTE in Sri Lanka last year.

The two factions are demanding that the assets held by the LTTE abroad should be shared, apart from their new ideologies, informed sources said. V. Ruthrakumar, a lawyer by profession domiciled in the United States is the ‘architect’ behind the setting up of the so-called ‘Transnational Government’ of his faction.

Meanwhile, Tamil Nadu police had advised the Central Government of India not to grant permission for Malaysian Tamil politician P. Ramaswamy to arrive in Tamil Nadu, sources said.

The Tamil Nadu State Government is due to hold an International Tamil Literary conference in Coimbatore later this month.

Several Tamil scholars from various parts of the world have been invited for the event.

However, Tamil Nadu Police which had scanned the background of the Malaysian politico Ramaswamy has instructed the Central government of India to prevent his entry into Tamil Nadu as he was a hardcore LTTE supporter and criticised even the Government of India for its stance against the LTTE, the sources said.

Courtesy: SundayObserver 


http://www.tops.lk/article19854-two-tamils-arrested-in-paris-over-mans-death-tiger-infighting-mounts-europe.html

Tamils arrested for burning Sri Lankan flag - India

Dutch Tamils arrested for illegal Tigers fundraising

Tamils in the Netherlands have been forced to donate money to the LTTE, the Tamil separatist army, to pay for its war against Sri Lanka’s government army. Dutch court authorities say the Tigers held these people in ‘a stranglehold’, forcing them to pay a ‘war tax’.

The investigation has been going on for two years. Several people have been arrested, including the alleged leader of the Dutch branch of the Tigers.

Reprisals
Court documents, published by Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad, say that the Tamil Tigers systematically extorted large sums of money from Dutch Tamils. If they refused, they were threatened with reprisals.

Tens of thousands of Tamils live in the Netherlands. The majority came to the country after the Tamil separatist war broke out in the mid-1980’s. The Tamil Tigers have been listed as a terrorist organisation in EU-countries such as the Netherlands since 2006.

The Netherlands is not the first European country where Tamils have been arrested for money laundering and extortion. Last year, Tamils in Switzerland and the UK were arrested for the same reason. While the Dutch Tamils are still awaiting trial, in the UK and Switzerland several people have already been convicted.

Common
Dr Christopher McDowell of the City University London  has published extensively on the Tamil diaspora in Europe. He told RNW that it used to be very common for Tamil groups to raise funds for the homeland.

"From the early 1980s, hundreds of thousands of Tamils fled Sri Lanka and moved to Europe, the US or East Asia,” he says. “Many of them felt quite guilty because they got out and were safe. Out of this guilt, they were willing to give money to the people who stayed behind."

According to Mr McDowell, most people didn’t overtly pledge money for the military cause. “The LTTE was very effective in promoting humanitarian causes to help their own people,” he says. “A number of these causes were very closely entwined with the LTTE and most people tended to turn a blind eye to that."

Globalisation
The Tamil diaspora has become known for its ability to raise huge funds – with or without criminal intent –  for the people in their homeland. "In the ‘80s you saw a very rapid and sudden movement of Tamils across the globe," Mr McDowell says. "They took advantage of the upcoming globalisation and new technologies to keep the diaspora closely in touch with themselves. They were easy to target."

Defeat
The Tigers’ defeat in 2009 quickly lead to a severe weakening of the organisational structure of the LTTE, including a worldwide power struggle, which has subsequently lead to less money being raised.

"This conflating of crime and political fundraising was particularly nasty. People obviously felt under enormous pressure against threats of physical violence," says Mr McDowell. "But despite the end of the war, fundraising apparently still continues."

http://www.rnw.nl/english/article/dutch-tamils-arrested-illegal-tigers-fundraising

27 Tamils arrested for trying to burn the Indian national flag

CHENNAI: Twenty-seven people, owing allegiance to two little known pro-Sri Lankan Tamils outfits, from Chennai, Coimbatore and Erode were arrested for attempting to burn the national flags of India and Sri Lanka. 

Fifteen activists of the Tamil Desiya Viduthalai Iyakkam (Tamil Nationalist Liberation Movement) and Tamil Desa Poduvudamai Katchi (Tamil National Socialist Party) gathered in front of Shastri Bhavan here, which houses various Central government offices, including the passport office and tried to set the flags afire before they were arrested, police said. 

Eight persons belonging to Tamil Nationalist Socialist Party were arrested at Coimbatore when they attempted to burn the Sri Lankan national flag near the district collectorate. 

Police foiled the activists' attempt to burn the Sri Lankan and Indian flags at the Collectorate, as tight security has been put in place following prior information. 

Police overpowered the activists who had a Sri Lankan flag dipped in kerosene and recovered it, besides an Indian Tricolour. 

At Erode also, four persons belonging to the organisations were arrested for attempts to burn the flags. 

In a press release, the outfits alleged that despite repeated pleas from Tamil Nadu to press Colombo for a ceasefire, the Government of India had not done enough to prevent the "killings" of Lankan Tamils.

http://www.defence.pk/forums/world-affairs/25698-27-tamils-arrested-trying-burn-indian-national-flag.html