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The gang targeted the victims of previous horse racing and gambling scams
Published: 16 September 2025
Gang members who posed as private detectives to defraud more than £110,000 from victims of previous horse racing and betting scams have been jailed.
Rogue builder Christopher Call, 36, and his associate Charles Palmer, 43, who fled to Spain in the aftermath, led a fake scheme offering fraud victims compensation in exchange for commission paid upfront, Teesside Crown Court heard.
Kevin Ratcliffe, 44, lent the pair a Bentley to help portray them as successful businessmen while Joseph Holden, 35, allowed the money to be paid into his bank account.
Judge Francis Laird KC said the gang from Sussex targeted vulnerable and “desperate” people who had already lost thousands of pounds.
Between March and October 2020, four victims of earlier horse racing and gambling scams received text messages or calls telling them they could get some compensation, the judge said.
When they responded, the victims were invited to meetings with Call and Palmer who claimed they were private investigators and detectives who could get their money back, the court heard.
‘Appearance of success’
One woman, who had lost about £20,000 in a gambling fraud several years earlier, ended up paying the gang more than £82,500 after meeting them in Birmingham, the judge said.
A 79-year-old man, who had also lost about £20,000 in an earlier scam, gave the fraudsters £6,680, while a woman was “pressured” into paying them more than £21,000, the court heard.
A fourth victim, who had lost £183,000 in a horse racing scam, met the fraudsters at the Belfry Hotel in Sutton Coldfield but was “suspicious” and refused to give them any money, “despite persistent attempts” to get her to do so, the judge said.
Call and Palmer would sometimes arrive in a Bentley loaned to them by Ratcliffe, who was jailed for 14 years in January 2024 for drug offences and a further two years three months in February this year for cheating the public revenue.
“That car gave the appearance of success and wealth thereby encouraging the victims to participate by increasing the level of trust placed in the perpetrators,” Judge Laird said.
‘Substandard’ roofing work
Call, who had a history of offences including a five-year prison term for fraud from 2014, was jailed for four years three months for the compensation scam and a further two years three months for fraudulent trading relating to his roofing business YRB.
The firm, run with his partner who is awaiting sentence for her role, did “substandard” work at “grossly inflated prices” at the homes of four elderly people in the Dorset area between July 2021 and August 2022, the judge said.
Several were told by Call, of Cooks Hill in Rudgwick, Horsham, West Sussex, they needed new roofs after they asked him just to clean moss, the court heard.
One woman had agreed to pay £650 for moss removal but was then told the roof needed replacing at a cost of £21,500 plus VAT, for which she paid an £8,400 deposit.
She refused to pay any more after speaking to a neighbour who had building experience, which promoted several visits and phone calls from Call demanding payment, the court heard.
Call admitted conspiracy to defraud and fraudulent trading.
Palmer, of Buttercup Walk in Brighton, fled to Spain before his trial and had to be extradited back to the UK where he eventually admitted conspiracy to defraud.
He was jailed for four and a half years while Ratcliffe, of HMP Elmley, was jailed for 20 months which will be served consecutive to his current prison sentences.
Holden, of Elm Grove in Lancing, West Sussex, was jailed for two years and three months after being found guilty of conspiracy to defraud.
Judge Laird said the gang targeted “vulnerable people” who were “desperate to recover some or all of their losses”.
Full story at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c931yjl3w3qo
Posted by: Ian (D. Withers)
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