Wolf Brock Cameron to stand trial accused of fraudulently and dishonestly causing financial detriment

The alleged “ringleader” of a Queensland car rebirthing racket accused of buying written-off vehicles and reselling them for profit to dozens of unsuspecting motorists is set to stand trial.

Wolf Brock Cameron leaves Brisbane Magistrates Court, after a committal hearing on a single charge of fraud in excess of $100,000. Picture: Liam Kidston

The alleged “ringleader” of a Queensland car rebirthing racket will stand trial accused of buying written-off vehicles, installing fake identification numbers, and reselling the cars for profit to dozens of unsuspecting motorists.

He is accused of re-registering and reselling an estimated 50 vehicles for almost 11 months, mostly using Facebook Marketplace and Gumtree, while operating out of a home in Regents Park in Logan with three other alleged accomplices.

Wolf Brock Cameron and Wilson Gregory, and two others, were arrested and jointly charged with 147 offences in July 2020. All were under the age of 24 at the time.

Gregory has had his matters finalised, but one of the other cases is still ongoing.

Wolf Cameron faced a committal hearing in Brisbane Magistrates Court on Tuesday. He started the day staring down 147 charges, but most of these were immediately dropped.

There were a handful of lesser summary charges leftover, and these will be dealt with separately at a later date.

But mainly, the dozens of fraud charges against Wolf Cameron were replaced with a single fraud charge on Tuesday, for the purposes of the committal hearing.

Mr Cameron is accused of fraudulently and dishonestly causing financial detriment to others while yielding at least $100,000 for himself.

The alleged syndicate operated across South East Queensland between August 30, 2019 and July 17, 2020.

Wolf Brock Cameron leaving the Brisbane Magistrates Court. Picture: Liam Kidston

On Tuesday, the committal hearing had one witness for cross-examination, Wilson Gregory – once co-accused, now prosecution witness.

Mr Gregory told the court that Mr Cameron had a variety of aliases he used to advertise and sell the vehicles under – Brock Mullany, Brock Cole, Bailey Cole, and Zachary Cole.

Mr Gregory described Mr Cameron as the “top dog”, “ringleader” and “his decisions were final” among the group, this included if potential buyers tried to lower the asking price of any cars the group was selling.

The group’s various identities weren’t limited to online profiles, Mr Gregory discussed how they would change their legal names and order new driver’s licences.

The court heard they used a fake address in Banora Point in northern NSW. New identity documents were mailed to a two-unit complex, but the address used was the non-existent third unit.

Mr Gregory told the court the group would regularly drive down to the Banora Point unit complex to check for and collect their fraudulent mail.

“When I say change our names regularly, I mean on social media and Gumtree to avoid anybody seeing the same names over and over and raising suspicion,” Mr Gregory told the Brisbane Magistrates Court on Tuesday.

“I was told changing my name legally would help reset my credit rating and potentially hide any wrongdoing from the police because I would assume this new name and identity.”

Sections of Mr Gregory’s statement were read during the hearing.

“We all agreed to the plan, we were going to find written-off cars that were still drivable and still looked fine, then register and re-sell them. I knew we could not register written-off cars, but I was told [by Wolf Cameron] not to worry about it,” one paragraph read.

When asked to elaborate in court on Tuesday by Mr Cameron’s defence barrister Isaac Munsie, Mr Gregory explained how the group found their cars.

“I was aware that written-off cars couldn’t be re-registered and expressed that thought, Wolf very quickly said to me that it was okay and there were ways around it,” he told the court.

“All of the vehicles were purchased from vehicle auctions, or some were purchased from a man out in Nerang who had unrepairable write-offs in his backyard and we purchased three of those vehicles and drove them home in a convoy.”

Mr Gregory told the court the group had a method to change vehicle identification numbers.

“I recall we would try to cover the VIN engraved under the driver’s seat in some of the vehicles,” another section of Mr Gregory’s statement, which was read aloud, said.

“Wolf and one of the alleged accomplices came up with the idea of having little pieces of metal and getting an engraver to write a new VIN number and attach it to the car so if anyone saw it would be the fake VIN number. I did the engraving on one or two of the cars.”

Despite exposing some lacking details in part of Mr Gregory’s evidence, defence barrister Isaac Munsie ultimately conceded there was a prima facie case against his client.

Mr Cameron was committed by Deputy Chief Magistrate Anthony Gett for trial in the Brisbane District Court at a date to be determined.

He remains on bail and did not enter a plea in court on Tuesday.