Author: Cristian Lipciuc

Melanie Kilgour – who is currently a teacher at a Secondary College in Shepparton – pleaded guilty to accusations of pocketing nearly $150,000 AUD of funds from the Alexandra Community Hub back in 2019.

Update 03/05/2021: Image removed.
Update 06/07/2021: Melanie gives her side of the story

In court, Melanie Kilgour – who also goes by married name Melanie Gourlay, stated that “the funds were all gone”.

Out of a total of $148,908 AUD – which was drained from the Community Hub’s accounts through a total of 38 separate transactions, $50,000 purportedly went to a friend who never paid her back, and an undisclosed amount was spent on house repairs.

National Australia Bank Spotted Different Signature

The fraud was detected due to Mrs Kilgour forging the signature of the Alexandra Community Hub director’s signature to the bank.

When NAB detected that the signature of John Cannon – the local Community Hub director –  was substantially different from previous signatures of his in their database, they reached out to him for explanations.

However, Mr Cannon replied that he had not signed off on any of those transactions. What’s more, he was not even in the area at the time the transactions were allegedly signed.

Overseas Bitcoin Lover Took The Money

Outside of the $50,000 sent to the mysterious debt-dodging friend, the defence claimed that some had been spent on home repairs – and that the rest of it had been sent in Bitcoin to an “overseas lover” who had taken the money and disappeared.

However, Judge Michael Tinney was not quite impressed with these Mt. Gox-esque explanations.

“(The home renovations) it’s false is it … what there a builder? What’s the cost of the house? It’s impossible for me to act on submissions from the bar table … well the scammers aren’t (the builders) are they … these internet transactions mean nothing to me.”

Mrs Kilgour apparently sold her house in Alexandra recently for a total of $116,000, which were placed in a trust fund that will allegedly be liquidated and used to pay back ACH.

Mrs Kilgour will reappear before the court on the 24^th of June.

Speaking to ABC News, financial analyst Martin North warned crypto enthusiasts across Australia about the pitfalls associated with new crypto websites – whether they are exchanges or something else, such as shady individuals posing as investment advisors.

We have seen these actors pose as famous Australian people such as Dick Smith and Hugh Jackman to name but a few who have been targeted in these crypto scams.

Banks Cannot Help You

Mr. North stated that as crypto increases in value, the number of bad actors scouring the net to find naïve investors will also increase. Furthermore, Australian banks, if willing to help, often can’t do much themselves – as long as a transaction was done willingly, banks have a hard time recovering funds sent to fraudsters.

“A lot of it is actually through social media like Facebook groups or other online forums and in some cases this unfortunately points you not to necessarily very legitimate operators. And so it is quite feasible to get caught with somebody offering what looks like a great deal with regard to investing in crypto but it might not actually be a real company, it might be a scam company, a lot of those are offshore. And the problem of course if it’s offshore is that it’s not caught or protected with any legislation that protects Australian companies.”

For instance, Sylvia Chau – a Sydney resident who lost $2.6 million to an unlicensed crypto broker named Blue Lexus – was unable to get her money back. She later filed a case with the AFCA, who stated that although a few errors had been made by the bank in the handling of the case, they were not liable.

How to Spot Crypto Scams

However, situations like these can generally be avoided with a little sleuthing. For instance, dubious companies may often claim to be active in the crypto domain for years. Using services like the Internet Archive, we can easily check if this claim is true or not. Other platforms like Web Of Trust also allow you to check what others have to say about the website you plan to visit.  

Although banks will not always be willing to help in case of a mishap, a little bit of caution can help you avoid crypto scams – and the headaches.