Three foreigners jailed for credit card fraud

Two Latvians and a Russian were this morning each jailed for 18 months after they admitted to forming part of a criminal organisation and fraud.

The Latvians Edgars Kullis, 34 and Edgars Zobnevs, 21 and the Russian Vadimas Gruzdzevicius, 44, were charged with defrauding HSBC, Bank of Valletta and Air Malta.

Police inspector Ian Abdilla told the court that the three people arrived from the UK, where they lived, on Thursday.

Mr Zobnevs left on Sunday but returned on Monday with an empty suitcase and a number of counterfeit credit cards.

€4,000 were drawn from HSBC using these credit cards and €2,500 from BOV. Their tickets to come to Malta were also bought using fraudulent credit cards.

Inspector Abdilla said this was quite a common crime and the police had to deal with credit card fraud problems about every six months.

He the court the three were not the masterminds of the crime but people in financial difficulties who had been exploited.

In handing down judgement, Magistrate Antonio Micallef Trigona told the accused he could have jailed them for up to four years.