Last updated 13:12, May 15 2018
JOHN KIRK-ANDERSON/STUFF
Quang Nguyen, left, and his uncle, Hoang Nguyen, in the Christchurch District Court for sentencing on Tuesday.
Quang Nguyen, left, and his uncle, Hoang Nguyen, in the Christchurch District Court for sentencing on Tuesday.
Two Canadian bank card skimmers can expect deportation any day after being sentenced for their hopeless venture into the multi-billion dollar financial crime industry.
The uncle Hoang Nguyen, 39, and nephew Quang Nguyen, 28, have been held in custody for two-and-a-half months, meaning they have served half the five-month jail terms imposed by Christchurch District Court Judge Paul Kellar on Tuesday. They are immediately eligible for release.
The judge said he expected the pair to be contacted immediately by immigration authorities and be sent home.
The skimming equipment they brought into New Zealand and installed on automatic teller machines (ATMs) in New Brighton and Linwood will be destroyed.
In March the Nguyens pleaded guilty to joint charges of accessing computer systems – both Westpac ATMs – with intent to dishonestly obtain bankcard information.
The pair arrived in New Zealand on three-month visitor visas on February 26. They were equipped with skimming gear to get ATM users' bankcard details and PINs, and a list of eight Christchurch ATMs.
But they escaped with nothing from the ATMs they had altered.
Quick action by Westpac staff and police meant the devices were spotted soon after they were installed and the Nguyens were found at their accommodation with more skimming gear, cameras, a laptop and the list.
The Nguyens pleaded guilty to joint charges of accessing computer systems – both Westpac ATMs – with intent to dishonestly obtain bankcard information.
Judge Kellar said skimming details and cloning bank cards was the fastest growing electronic crime with annual losses of $8 billion in the United States alone. New Zealand losses amounted to millions of dollars a year.
Police prosecutor Bronwen Blackmore said the fact the pair came to New Zealand intending to commit crime was an aggravating factor and it was fortuitous that bank staff were able to intervene before there was any loss.
Counsel for Quang Nguyen, Colin Eason, said his client was a restaurant manager who had planned a long trip through the Pacific, Middle East and then to Vietnam to visit an ageing grandparent.
"The cost of part of that journey has been lost – he accepts that."
Both Eason and Hoang Nguyen's lawyer Elizabeth Bulger urged the judge not to impose extra jail time for premeditation because preparation was part of the nature of the offence.
Her client had not yet been contacted Immigration New Zealand, but he had no problem with immediate deportation on his release.
Judge Kellar said it was reasonably serious and sophisticated offending against a banking industry that relied on people having confidence in its systems. There was a high degree of planning and sophistication.
He reduced the Nguyens' jail terms because they had no criminal records in Canada and they had pleaded guilty early.