News and Star
Last updated 10:05, Saturday, 07 June 2008
A gang member who posed as a doctor to steal more than £100,000 from health workers across the UK has been jailed for three years.
For eight months the gang got away with breaking into doctors’ lockers in hospitals, taking cash and cards – until they came to Carlisle and a quick-thinking bank clerk realised something was wrong.
Thirty-six-year-old Gary O’Neil was the last member to be caught and he was jailed at Carlisle Crown Court yesterday after admitting conspiracy charges.
Prosecutor Tim Evans told how the three-strong gang broke into lockers while surgeons were in the operating theatre and stole cash, credit cards and personal items.
They dressed smartly and even wore stethoscopes and name badges to make people think they were genuine health workers.
The cards would then be used at banks or in shops, emptying accounts of thousands of pounds.
On some occasions, the gang even called up victims posing as police officers or bank officials to trick them into divulging PIN numbers.
Around 10 hospitals across the UK were targeted by Lee Watson, George Quinn and O’Neil from October 2006.
When they struck at the Cumberland Infirmary last June they took the credit cards and driving licence of Dr Dylan Jones, who was in theatre.
Less than two hours later, they walked into the Royal Bank of Scotland where Quinn withdrew £4,200, posing as Dr Jones.
He tried the same thing at another branch but the clerk became suspicious because she knew the real Dr Jones, Mr Evans said.
He left the bank and got into a green Mondeo – the registration was noted by bank staff – and police were called.
“The green Mondeo was stopped by police at St Nicholas Gate with three occupants,” Mr Evans said.
“Two fled leaving Watson in the car.”
The capture of Watson prompted a huge police investigation – led by DC Gary Watson – involving 14 police forces across the UK.
It emerged the trio had struck at hospitals in Durham, Derbyshire, Lincoln, Cheshire, Stockport, Devon and Cornwall, Sheffield, the west Midlands and Hampshire, before coming to Carlisle.
After Watson’s arrest, O’Neil and Quinn carried out two further thefts without him in Ipswich last July. The total amount stolen amounted to £109,629.28.
Quinn and Watson, both from the Coventry area, were jailed in February for four-and-a-half years.
Carlisle Crown Court heard how O’Neil, who is also from Coventry, initially drove the others around and claimed not to have known what they were doing.
He gradually became aware, however, and was ‘recruited to the team.’
He was described as ‘quite vulnerable’ due to tragic personal circumstances and had become addicted to drugs.
Judge Peter Hughes QC, who described the thefts as professionally executed and sophisticated, and said Watson and Quinn had developed the crime until it became a ‘practised art.’
O’Neil was jailed for three years after admitting conspiracy to steal and conspiracy to obtain by deception.
Speaking after the case, DC Watson said the case had been built on evidence from the Carlisle incident and he was proud that a team which had targeted the UK had been stopped in Cumbria. Judge Hughes paid tribute to DC Watson, who led the inquiry and asked for his comments to be passed to the Chief Constable.
YOU CALL THIS HEALTH CARE?! 