Nine of New Zealand’s Most Brutal Fraudsters, Counterfeiters and Counterfeiters and How They Got Caught

How a man pretending to be a doctor could work in one of the busiest hospitals in the country posed with regard to questions about how it’s easy for such important deceptions to go unnoticed.

If the list below is anything to go by, it’s easier to get to than some might think.

The police are now investigating after Yuvaraj Krishnan is claimed to have used false documents to secure a job at Middlemore Hospital where he worked for several months and saw dozens of patients before it was discovered that he was in fact not a registered physician.

It has since been revealed that he was previously caught in college after pretending to be a medical student for two years, during which time he is said to have dissected cadavers.

There are plenty of examples of others using fraudulent credentials, both medical and otherwise, both in New Zealand and abroad. Here are some.

READ MORE:
* Man posing as a doctor to work at Middlemore Hospital named
* Alleged scammer doctor used fake document to get rid of driver’s license
* Apologies to patients of alleged impostor, 11 days after concerns were raised
* Health care system under ‘stress’ enabled alleged fake doctor to get Middlemore job
* Alleged fake doctor posing as University of Auckland medical student dissected cadavers
* Police investigating alleged scammer at Middlemore Hospital

The False Psychiatrists

New Zealand woman Empire of Zholia​ practiced psychiatry in the UK for 22 years despite having no qualifications.

In 2018, she was convicted of fraud and theft after she was found to have manipulated the will of an elderly dementia patient in an attempt to inherit the retiree’s £1.3 million (NZ$2.4 million) estate.

Alemi falsely claimed that she had obtained a medical degree from the University of Auckland when she applied to work in the UK in 1995, but had in fact dropped out of medical school after failing the first year of her five-year degree. .

Her fraudulent activities led to an urgent investigation of around 3,000 foreign doctors working in the UK by the General Medical Council, which decides whether a doctor is qualified to work in the UK.

Another fake psychiatrist was Mohamed Shakeel Siddiqui, who worked for the Waikato District Health Board for six months in 2015 with a salary of $165,250 before his credentials were suspected and charges were filed.

Originally from India, he used the credentials of a real psychiatrist, Dr. Mohammed Shafi Siddiqui, who works in Illinois, America.

After the case, which lasted more than two years, he was… sentenced to four years and three months in prison in the Hamilton District Court in 2017 on four counts of cheating and forgery.

New Zealand’s most notorious art forger

It is believed that New Zealand’s only convicted art forger, Karl Simo, forged the paintings of no fewer than 0 different artists before he died in 2013.

The Mangaweka-born man was taken to court in the mid-1980s for falsifying the work of CF Goldie and Petrus van der Velden, where he was convicted on 40 counts, fined $1,000 and ordered to shut down City Hall. and paint Foxton’s public space. toilets as part of a 200-hour community service order.

He later changed his name to Carl Feodor Goldie so that he could legally sign his Goldie works.

Sim was so famous that the biennial Contest and Exhibition on Counterfeits and Counterfeits used to be founded in honor of the Yellow Art Gallery of the city of Rangitikei.

He was one of the names that came up when it was discovered that the Alexander Turnbull Library Paid $75,000 in Public Money for a Forged Lindauer Portrait.

The Fraud of the Ministry of Transport

A former senior manager at the Department of Transportation Joanne Harrison​, also known as Joanne Sharp​, was convicted in 2017 of stealing more than $720,000 from the ministry that uses invoices to pay three entities over a four-year period.

In 2019, a Stuff Circuit research discovered she had changed her name to Joanna Middleton and used that identity to apply for high-paying jobs at two major companies in the UK, where she was deported after serving less than two years of her three-year and seven-month sentence.

The disgraced top defense scientist

Stephen Wilce, head of the Defense Technology Agency (DTA) and New Zealand’s foremost defense scientist, resigned after Bizarre and Improbable Claims of Him Were Unveiled by TV3’s 60 Minutes.

She including a British Royal Marine veteran and member of the British bobsleigh team at the 1988 Calgary Olympicsaccording to the TV show, which said there was no record of Wilce serving in the Marines and no bobsleigh team had heard of him.

The False Tahitian Prince

Kiwi fraudster Joel Morehu-Barlow​, official name Hohepa Hikairo Morehu-Barlow​, was 14 years in prison in 2013, after pocketing A$16.69m (NZ$17.4m) from his employer, Queensland Health, between 2007 and 2011.

He was allegedly used the proceeds of his crimes to fund a lavish Brisbane lifestyleand when asked about this by his colleagues, he told them that he was a Tahitian prince.

After his arrest in 2011Australian police discovered a treasure trove of luxury items fit for royalty in his waterfront home, includes an iPod inscribed with “HRH” – the title for His Royal Highness, 30 pairs of Louis Vuitton shoes and a crown that was auctioned to get back some of the money he embezzled.

The fake lawyer who allegedly scammed thousands of the vulnerable

When 22-year-old Kieran Withers, who claimed to be a millionaire?, took thousands of dollars from his victims in Auckland and Christchurch.

The Pukekohe man’s violation came to light after several fraud complaints were filed with police, leading to him being sentenced to two years and nine months behind bars on charges including obtaining money through cheating and dishonesty. use of a document.