Landmark UK legal case sees ticketing fraudsters convicted

In a landmark case, two men who used specialist software to buy thousands of concert tickets and then resell them at significantly marked up prices have been convicted on fraud charges by a Court in the United Kingdom.

Peter Hunter, aged 51, and David Smith, aged 66, used a sophisticated computer program to make high speed purchases of concert tickets, acquiring £4 million (US$5.2 million) worth of tickets from primary seller websites between June 2015 and December 2017.

According to UK Crown Prosecutors, they then made a US$9.1 million profit be selling them at vastly inflated prices on secondary seller websites such as Viagogo.

As reported by London newspaper The Daily Telegraph, artists whose concerts they profited from included Gary Barlow, Coldplay and The Killers, as well as television shows including Eurovision, The X Factor and Strictly Come Dancing.

The first bulk ticket resellers to be successfully prosecuted in the UK, Hunter and Smith were this week found guilty of three counts of fraudulent trading and one count of possessing an article for use in fraud after a three-month trial at Leeds Crown Court.

The case followed an investigation by consumer group National Trading Standards into bulk reselling on the internet - an industry worth around US$9.1 billion - in 2017.

As reported by The Daily Telegraph, Jonathan Sandiford, prosecuting, previously told the jury that Hunter and Smith were "dishonest fraudsters motivated by greed".

They bought around 1,000 tickets every 72 hours and advertised them on secondary seller websites almost immediately.

To disguise their bulk buying, which is not permitted by many websites, they used 97 fake names linked to 88 addresses. These identities were linked to multiple email addresses, credit cards and mobile numbers.

Hunter, who used to be a chef, said he realised how lucrative it was when a waitress he worked with asked him to buy four Madonna concert tickets for her, as she didn't have a credit card.

He ended up buying 10 tickets and sold them on for double the price using eBay.

He and Smith advertised Ed Sheeran tickets online for almost three times their face value, buying up more than 1,000 for US$103,000 and reselling them for almost three times that amount.

Following the ruling, National Trading Standards Chair, Lord Toby Harris stated “millions of people spend their hard-earned money on tickets such as music concerts and sporting events each year.

"Buying a ticket in good faith and then discovering it is part of a dishonest fraud can be deeply distressing and can have a considerable financial impact on consumers.

“This is a landmark case for National Trading Standards and should reassure consumers that the fraudulent practices of secondary ticket sellers will no longer be tolerated.

"I hope this prosecution leads to a step-change in the secondary ticketing market, making it easier and safer for consumers buying tickets in the future.”

FanFair Alliance, which campaigns against illegal ticket touting, said the case shone a light on the "murky world of secondary ticketing".

FanFair Alliance Campaign Manager, Adam Webb advised "we strongly suspect Peter Hunter and David Smith are not exceptional, and that other suppliers to these sites may also acquire tickets by unlawful means - no questions asked.

"Given the outcome of this case, it is now urgent that National Trading Standards are resourced to increase the scope of their investigations, and for the Competition & Markets Authority to apply further scrutiny towards the secondary ticketing market overall."

The pair will be sentenced on 24th February.