Gardaí arrest second suspect in €1.1m invoice fraud investigation

Gardaí have arrested a second suspect over the theft of €1.1 million from a Dublin company that fell victim to an invoice-redirect fraud in November.

The targeted company was sent an email, which it believed was from another firm it traded with, informing it that its trading partner had changed its bank account details.

However, the email had been sent by fraudsters posing as the trading partner. The fraudsters also sent an invoice for a large sum of money, asking that the sum be paid into the new bank account.

When a payment of €1.1 million was made, it was lodged to the bank account controlled by the fraudsters and the scam was only discovered after the money had been transferred.

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Operation Parade

The Garda National Economic Crime Bureau was alerted and began an investigation, Operation Parade. The first phase of that investigation was to track the exact location of the money before freezing it. That part of the inquiry was successful and about €1 million was returned to the company that had been duped.

Last month gardaí made their first arrested in the case when a suspect in his 20s was detained in Lucan, Co Dublin. On Tuesday and second suspect was arrested, another man in his 20s.

“The man is currently being detained for questioning at Naas Garda station under the provisions of Section 50 of the Criminal Justice Act. He can be held for up to seven days,” a Garda spokesperson said of Tuesday’s arrest.

The first suspect detained was released without charge after a period in custody last month and a file on the case was being prepared for the Director of Public Prosecutions. The money that was retrieved had been dispersed among a number of bank accounts, which were identified by gardaí and frozen so the cash could not be withdrawn or spent.