Fugitive, Peter Foster, is alleged to have made millions from the sports betting industry whilst eluding police for 12-months since failing to appear at a Federal Court in Brisbane where he was found in contempt of court.
Aussie Conman, Peter Foster, has been arrested in Byron Bay, New South Wales, after a period of 12-months on the run from police, after failing to appear at a Federal Court in Brisbane, where he was found guilty of contempt, for ignoring a ban imposed in 2005 preventing him from being involved in the weight loss industry.
Foster received the ban after it was revealed he managed to persuade investors to part with over £3.5 million on the say so that he had a nasal spray that could help people lose weight. In his absence he was sentenced to three years in jail.
After Foster’s recent arrest, his solicitor had a gem of a story to tell the waiting reporters: “He’s a bit shell-shocked at the moment, but his main concern is that he gets reunited with his mother because he’s been looking after his mother for the last 11 months. He’s effectively been living like a monk.’
A very rich monk if you believe private investigator: Ken Gamble, who was hired by the television production team, from Channel Nine’s ‘A Current Affair’ TV programme, to track down the whereabouts of Foster. It was during his digging that he discovered that he had been earning millions as the co-founder of the online betting company: The Sports Trading Club.
Foster, who was on Interpol’s most wanted list, achieved infamy, in 2003, when he starred – rather reluctantly – in a British television documentary called: The Conman, His Lover and the Prime Minister’s Wife, chronicling the events of 2002 when Foster helped Cherie Blair – wife of the former British PM, Tony Blair – purchase two flats in Bristol.
After the monk’s conman’s arrest, he faced the magistrate charged with assaulting a police officer, and resisting arrest, after a surveillance team pounced on him near his hideout.
During the arrest, which was filmed, you can hear a policeman telling Foster to “let go of the gun.”
A gun!
Fortunately, Foster’s solicitor – the same one that said he had been living like a monk – had another quite rational explanation.
The solicitor told reporters that, ‘his client had not realized he had grabbed one of the officers weapons’, and that, ‘my client’s stated he was just simply grabbing at it – it could have been a torch.”
Ooh err.
Foster, who had also spent time behind bars in the UK, Australia, the US, and Vanuatu, will now be extradited to nearby Queensland where he will serve his sentence.
Sports Trading Club was in the news as recently as September, when iGaming Business reported that they had sold 50% of their business to BVI’s Universal Sports Group, in a move that saw them expand their business from Australia & New Zealand towards South Africa and Asia.
The Daily Mail stated that “Sports Trading Club has now taken its last bet” but the site still appears to be up and running.
