Riverina man charged over alleged multi-million dollar cattle fraud
A man will front court accused of running an elaborate cattle business across Sydney, Melbourne and the Riverina, earning more than $2.5 million selling cows which either didn’t exist or were dead.
The Wagga News
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A man will front court accused of being involved a multi-million dollar cattle fraud near Wagga.
The 45-year-old man is accused of running joint business ventures with farmers and on-sold cattle that either did not exist, was deceased prior to purchase or had been on-sold without their knowledge.
Police will allege the fraudulent amount the man made is worth more than $2.5 million.
Officers from the Rural Crime Prevention Unit, assisted by Riverina police, executed a search warrant over a number of days at a rural property in Kyeamba near Wagga Wagga on December 17.
Investigators seized computers, documentation and a number of angus cows and calves for examination.
More than 400 angus cows and calves were inspected by rural crime investigators.
Following investigations, the Riverina man was arrested on Wednesday and charged with eight counts of fraud.
He is due to face Wagga Local Court on June 24.
Riverina Police District Commander, Superintendent Bob Noble, said the extensive investigation had identified the alleged fraudulent activities had occurred “over several years”.
He said there were “large number of (alleged) victims or witnesses”, that more charges may be laid and others potentially arrested.
“If we can uncover (more charges), we’ll process those as well,” he said.
“We’re talking about significant losses. Quite possibly the person might’ve been working in concert with others. That’s a focus of our investigation, which continues.
“We hope this message goes out far and wide because these types of crimes tend not to be isolated geographically.”
Superintendent Noble said in this case, the alleged fraudulent activities occurred in the Riverina, Sydney and Melbourne.
“We do believe there may be other victims out there. We’re quite confident of it. We do encourage anyone with information about other victims or just evidence of this crime generally to contact us,” he said.
Superintendent Noble said local farm owners had been devastated in recent times.
“Our farming community is suffering at the moment with recent droughts and bushfires, so to go through loss of stock on top of that is devastating,” Supt Noble said.
“Our rural crime prevention team and local police have been working tirelessly during the course of this investigation to recover stock and work through documentation we will allege is related to fraudulent activity.
“We will continue to target and combat crime in all its forms.”
State rural crime coordinator, Detective Inspector Cameron Whiteside, said the arrest was the culmination of great work by local police and rural crime investigators.
“We urge the rest of the farming community to speak up if you’ve been affected by a crime such as this and report any suspicious behaviour.”
Anyone with information about this matter is urged to contact Wagga Police Station on 6922 2599 or Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.