“I have not done anything wrong,” Claudine Bryce, of Newport, told The Daily Telegraph. The action against Ms Bryce has been brought by Melbourne’s Romeo and Carmela Avallone, who are living in a friend’s shed after they say they were fleeced by someone of $350,000.In June last year the Avallones signed a contract to buy a house — before they had a loan approval from their bank. When they asked for $150,000 they say the request was rejected because their income had fallen during the pandemic. According to an affidavit filed in the NSW Supreme Court, after being knocked back Mr Avallone searched the internet, came across a mortgage broking website and entered his details.Two days later he received a phone call from a person calling himself “Dale Mcvey”, who claimed to be a loan manager. Mr Mcvey said he would seek ‘low-doc’ finance. It is now believed this person was using a false name.Mr Avallone provided tax returns plus his driver’s licence and Medicare card. Shortly after, “Mr Mcvey” emailed to say a loan had been approved. But, he said, to obtain unconditional approval the Avallones would have to pay $360,000 into the broking business’ trust account, in the name PRI Holdings.Mr Avallone did so within two days and a fortnight later he engaged a conveyancer. Over the following week the conveyancer tried to contact Mr Mcvey but was unable to.Mr Avallone also tried, without success. He then asked his bank’s fraud team to get involved and made a report to the police.He also went looking for more information about the broking business and found a mobile number, which he called.You might think only the naive and gullible fall victim to online scams, but scammers actually target everyone. Here’s how to avoid falling into their traps.The person who answered was Geoff Russell, the real owner of the broking business, Mortgage King, a person not accused of wrongdoing.Mr Russell said a counterfeit version of his website had been created by someone he didn’t know.Mr Avallone said in his affidavit: “It was then that I knew I had been the victim of a fraud.”Mr Russell told The Telegraph he had been contacted by four people who had been scammed in a similar fashion.The Avallones’ bank was only able to recover $9400. The couple’s civil court action seeks “equitable compensation” from Ms Bryce, who is a director of PRI Holdings.Ms Bryce is defending the claim and denies any wrongdoing.Mr Avallone told The Telegraph he had instructed his lawyers to “leave no stone unturned to get full recovery of our loss.”However, Ms Bryce said she had been fleeced too, with the same ruse costing her hundreds of thousands of dollars.She said all the money paid into the PRI account by the Avallones was taken by the scammer.The person behind the fraudulent activity is believed to be based overseas and to have used other aliases including Mark Solomon and Clint Young to financially cripple people across Australia. Victoria Police said NSW Police was the lead investigator into the scam. But NSW Police said it was not.The Australian Federal Police said it was not a matter for them, as did the Australian Securities and Investments Commission.



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