A Romanian fraudster who has lived in Ireland for 12 years, and who will be sentenced in a latest prosecution next month, has reportedly been described by a senior Garda source as a “walking, talking crime wave”.
The Independent’s Ken Foy reported that 34-year-old Calin Scintei, a Romanian national, is currently awaiting sentencing relating to his role in the use of “cash-trapping” devices at ATMs in Stillorgan and Dún Laoghaire last summer, but that he had previously received a four-and-a-half-year jail term in 2021 after pleading guilty to 25 charges, including participation in organised crime.
Scintei with an address at Citywest in Dublin, was previously jailed in 2021 and has been a major target for the Garda National Economic Crime Bureau (GNECB), the paper said.
The 2021 conviction also included admission of fraud offences, criminal damage, theft and possessing the proceeds of crime on dates between August 2018 and January 2020.
Scintei had used used bogus identification to open twenty seven bank accounts for a violent international crime gang who run internet scams and are heavily involved in prostitution and theft.
“This individual is a trusted member of an organised crime gang involved in multiple fraud scams,” a source told the Independent. “He has graduated in the criminal hierarchy from stealing phones in nightclubs in Dublin city centre when he first came here to the senior position he is now in.”
Scintei has been described by a senior source as a “walking, talking crime wave”.
One victim of the money laundering crime he was sentenced for in 2021 was a woman who had nearly €10,000 stolen from her after she was sent a fake text from Revenue saying she was entitled to a refund, while on maternity leave, the Sunday World reported.
Sentencing him at that time, Judge Martin Nolan noted Scintei was “not a master criminal” – but “he was certainly a busy criminal”. The Romanian national had “intelligence”, “charm” and “guile”, which he used to “advance his criminal behaviour,” Judge Nolan said.
He had also been fined fined €13,000 at Dublin District Court in 2019 for dodging significant numbers of M50 tolls. At that time, the court heard he had been sent 1,700 letters about 581 unpaid tolls.
He will be sentenced for the cash-trapping offences on March 27, when the full facts will be heard in the case.