British domain scammer jailed for six years

By Matt Whipp

Posted on 17 Nov 2005 at 12:27

A 23-year-old Cambridge man has been sentenced to six years for conning people out of £1.6m and making violent threats.

Peter Francis-Macrae was found guilty at Peterborough Crown Court of fraudulent trading, concealing criminal property, threatening to destroy or damage property, blackmail, and making death threats.

He is believed to have made in excess of £50,000 a week through offering to register .eu domains, when he had no powers to do so. As much as £1.1m of his ill-gotten gains has been stashed away, say investigators, and Francis-Macrae is refusing to say where.

He had sent emails to companies offering to register .eu European domains, as well as mail-shots to others claiming their domains were due to expire, demanding a renewal fee.

When things started turning sour, Francis-Macrae's behaviour turned decidedly unsavoury, making death-threats, sending a bombardment of spam emails to companies complaining of the fraud, and even threatening to bring down the .uk registrar Nominet when it published a warning of his practices.

Indeed he is alleged to have caused a denial of service attack of quite another sort when, on his first arrest, he sent a spam email duping recipients into calling a number. That number belonged to the Chief Constable of Cambridgeshire, with the effect that thousands of calls were placed to the switchboard, jamming the system.

Detective Constable Jody Faro said that police had dealt with more than 2,000 complaints around the globe concerning Francis-Macrae's criminal activities.

'You deceived hundreds of people of countless thousands of pounds of their money. When investigated, following the countless complaints of your misdeeds, you resorted to threats to kill and a threat to set fire to property, and ultimately blackmail,' said Judge Nicholas Coleman. 'Whoever stood in the way of your criminality became subject to abuse and threats. You are, I think, one of the most vindictive young men I have ever seen.'

The sentencing rounds off a trial that first began in October.