Tragic Newport family hit by cash card scam (From South Wales Argus)

Tragic Newport family hit by cash card scam

1:58pm Thursday 26th November 2009

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A NEWPORT family whose 11-year-old son died suddenly a year ago are facing more heartbreak after money saved for the youngster’s headstone was stolen in a card cloning scam.

The family of Ryan Jones, of Coldra, Newport, were visiting their son's graveside to mark his 13th birthday when around £1,000 was taken from his stepdad John Wheat’s account.

The family are the latest victims of the scam involving four cash machines in Spytty Park, but neither Gwent Police nor the banks involved know how the cloning is being carried out.

Lliswerry High School pupil Ryan died in his sleep of sudden unexplained death in epilepsy (SUDEP) on September 30 last year.

Mr Wheat and Ryan's mum Sarah Shelton visit his grave in his home city of Birmingham every month with siblings Leah, 17, Charlee, 15, Blake, 9, Morgan 7, and Clayton, 5.

On November 17, Mr Wheat used a Lloyds TSB cash card to withdraw £60 from an RBS cash machine outside the Spytty Park Tesco store, before the family drove to the West Midlands to mark Ryan’s birthday on November 20.

But when Mr Wheat checked his bank statement on November 22, he found his account had been emptied at cash points in London over a period of five days.

“I just felt sick to my stomach,” said Mr Wheat, who volunteers part-time for the Welsh Ambulance Service. “There we were paying our respects to Ryan, not knowing that all our money was being taken.”

Gwent Police confirmed seven people have reported concerns in recent weeks about card cloning at the three RBS cash points at the Tesco store, and one Natwest machine at Boots in the retail park, but did not know how the thieves were cloning the cards.

RBS said they had not been notified of any problems at their Spytty Park machines, but similar scams are normally done by attaching a data reading device to the card slot of a cash point which scans the card's magnetic strip.

PIN numbers are then obtained using either a hidden camera or watching the victim as they punch in the combination.

Mr Wheat said his discovery was even more distressing because the family have been trying for over a year to save the £1,500 needed to buy Ryan's headstone, and he and his wife had also hoped to use some of the money for their other children's Christmas presents.

Lloyds TSB told Mr Wheat it would have to investigate the theft before he would be able to get his money back.

A Gwent Police spokeswoman urged anyone who suspected a machine has been tampered with to contact them on 101.

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