Karlamia Moore, Jacob Johnston jailed for $750K fraud empire

A South East Queensland couple have been handed a combined 17-year jail sentence for their role in a “sophisticated” fraud.

A South East Queensland couple have been jailed for a combined 17 years for their role in a “sophisticated criminal syndicate” which saw them con banks out of loans worth $715,000, with attempts to rip off a further $230,000.

Forest Lake duo Karlamia Moore, 45, and her partner Jacob Neil Johnston, 46, who both maintained another address at Spring Mountain in Ipswich, each pleaded guilty to more than a dozen fraud-type offences in Brisbane District Court on Friday.

They included fraud of a value greater than $100,000, six attempted frauds, money laundering knowingly, receiving tainted property, obtaining identification fraudulently, and other offences.

Johnston alone was convicted of further attempted frauds, possessing a commercial quantity of a Schedule 1 dangerous drug, and possessing drug utensils.

The court heard the “sophisticated criminal syndicate” was in operation between January 2018 and the pair’s second arrest on June 13, 2019, after they were initially charged with a string of offences partway through the scheme.

The court heard the pair’s operation involved unlawfully obtaining identification information for real people, registering prepaid SIM cards in their names and then creating email addresses using that information.

Inala fraudster Karlamia Moore, 45. Picture: Facebook

They also created fake driver’s licences and forged pay slips.

They then applied for hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of loans from eight different banks, receiving $714,870, with the pair also attempting to obtain another $130,000 and Johnston alone attempting to obtain a further $99,650.

The court heard that of the $714,000 successfully obtained, Moore, who has since moved to Inala, and Johnston spent $705,000, much of it to purchase high-end electronics which they would onsell, thus money laundering knowingly.

One customer of theirs purchased $521,000 worth of goods from them in over 229 transactions.

The customer has already been dealt with by the courts, receiving a three-year head sentence with significant matters in mitigation.

The court heard Moore and Johnston were initially charged with offences following a search warrant on their Forest Lake address on August 30, 2018.

This warrant uncovered an “extraordinary amount of incriminating material”, including machines for producing fake ID cards, detailed financial records and a number of fake IDs, the court heard.

They were released on bail but continued their operation apace, with it not ceasing until a second warrant executed on their Spring Mountain address on June 13, 2019.

It uncovered more incriminating evidence.

The court heard Johnston was sentenced in the Brisbane District Court on July 5, 2019 to 30 months’ imprisonment for fraud-type offences factually related to the current matters.

He has been in custody since June 13, 2019, a total of 918 days.

Moore, meanwhile, served a period of time remanded in pre-sentence custody between October 3 – December 23, 2019.

The court was told the pair’s criminal history only commenced in about 2015 when they fell on “hard times” due to the loss of both their jobs.

Gambling and drug abuse was a feature of their relationship, the court heard.

Johnston was sentenced to nine-and-a-half years’ imprisonment, with immediate parole eligibility, taking into account the 918 days he had already served.

Moore was sentenced to seven-and-a-half years.

Her parole eligibility was set at December 16, 2023 after she would have served two years of the sentence.