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Spotty showers; coldNews
Fake passport netted citizen applicant cash
29/11/2004
A Crumpsall man who used a forged passport as identification to
obtain bank accounts claimed he did it because he was unemployed
and not to run a lavish lifestyle.
Rashid Ali, aged 25, of Cedric Road, Rochdale, admitted he had a
falsified Pakistani passport he used dishonestly to open an account
with The Nationwide Building Society and a credit account with
Barclaycard. He admitted eight further to dishonest transactions
amounting to £337.
Peter Cave, prosecuting, said Ali had come to this country in 1998
where he obtained a false Pakistani passport which was one of a
large batch which had gone missing.
The passport was "doctored" to display his picture and with the
name Arif Choudry. He was granted the bank facilities in the name
of Arif Choudry.
Mr Cave acknowledged that the account Ali opened with Nationwide
was always in credit. However Ali had made cash withdrawals in
relation to the card obtained from Barclaycard.
Police circulated details of the passport theft to banks and
financial institutions and when Ali turned up at the Nationwide he
was arrested.
Mr Cave said Ali was open about the deception.
Married with one child he said he had applied to become a British
citizen but was still waiting for the application to be processed.
In the meantime he was unable to work and had no acceptable
identification to open bank accounts.
He was not involved in any theft of passports but he accepted he
had purchased one and falsified it. He had only used his credit
card for small purchases for his family and the fact one account
remained in credit showed he was not trying to avoid his
responsibilities in respect of money owed.
The magistrates accepted that the defendant had not used the cards
to deliberately "run up large debts."
After reading reports the magistrates made Ali subject to a
community punishment order for 100 hours and ordered him to pay
compensation of £337 and court costs of £60.
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