Two crime bosses who supplied fraudulent passports to the UK's most wanted fugitive Michael Moogan have been convicted after a five year probe.
Anthony Beard, 61, and Christopher Zietek, 67, were caught after a covert surveillance operation by the National Crime Agency (NCA) found they had provided fraudulently-obtained genuine passports (FOGs) to organised criminals. Customers paid between £5-15,000 for the highly sought after documents which were issued authentically but applied for using false information.
The passports were supplied to a number of offenders including former UK's most wanted fugitive Michael Moogan. The 37-year-old drug trafficker, branded a "Premier League" cocaine kingpin, spent eight years on the run after getting wind the NCA were seeking his arrest. Moogan was collared in Dubai in 2021 and jailed last week to 12 years at Manchester Crown Court.
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Other recipients of the passports included Glasgow murderers Jordan Owen and Christopher Hughes, Manchester fugitive David Walley, and suspected drug traffickers Barrie Gillespie, Jamie Stevenson and James White.
The NCA's investigation codenamed Operation Strey started in 2017 and ran in partnership with Dutch National Police and HM Passport Office - and was one of the most significant operations carried out in recent years. Beard and Zietek's crime group exploited vulnerable people - often with drink or drug issues - who were around the same age as their clients and with similar facial features.
They were paid for providing their expired passports and their details were then used to apply for new ones but with photographs of the criminals. The organised crime group (OCG) also paid others to countersign passport applications.
Beard, from Sydenham, London, was an expert in FOGs and NCA officers believe he had been procuring them for 20 years. He was involved in every aspect of organising and applying for the passports, including collecting application forms and planning the details to be provided by the applicant and the counter-signatory.
His fingerprints were found on many of the forms, and contact numbers he included were for a large number of burner phones he operated. Handwriting experts established he completed most of the application forms, and a voice recognition specialist determined Beard called HM Passport Office to chase up applications pretending to be the people named on the forms.
Zietek, who was formerly known as Christopher McCormack and was believed to be an enforcer for the Adams crime family in London, split his time between Sydenham, Ireland and Spain. He acted as the FOG broker and exploited his criminal connections to obtain clients for the crime group.
The NCA captured audio recordings in Zietek’s house of incriminating conversations with Beard and others about the application processes and their customers. Officers also went undercover to deliver some of the passports. Both men were arrested during coordinated raids in October 2021.
Between them charges were brought for offences of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, conspiracy to make a false instrument with intent (passports and ID documents), and money laundering. Beard changed his plea to guilty on January 3 2023, the first day of a nine-week trial at Reading Crown Court. Zietek was found guilty on March 17.
Both will be sentenced at a later date.
NCA Deputy Director Craig Turner said: "This organised crime group supplied fraudulent passports that enabled some of the UK’s most serious and dangerous criminals to operate internationally under false identities and pose a sustained threat to the public. The investigation demonstrates the NCA’s unique role in tackling the most serious and complex crime threats facing the UK.
"We have identified a chronic, under the radar conspiracy that enabled drug and firearm traffickers, murderers and fugitives to evade justice, and we have worked across borders to dismantle it and the bring the masterminds to account. The NCA continues to protect the UK from the serious and organised criminals who present a threat to our security, people and economy."
Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) specialist prosecutor Giorgina Venturella said: "The service provided by the defendants in this organised crime group enabled serious criminals, including drug and firearm traffickers and murderers, to go on the run as fugitives to evade detection and conduct criminal business internationally under false identities. Following collaboration with the NCA, the CPS was able to build a strong case resulting in their conviction, disrupting a major organised crime network and helping to dismantle their illegal operation."
Another member of the crime group Alan Thompson, 72, of Sutton, Surrey, was also found guilty for brokering of FOG passports. All three will be sentenced at Reading Crown Court at a later date.
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