Signum2011 web - UK P&I

Specialised detection
- a unique organisation, pursuing criminal investigations for our Members

Making Contact
The two Signum investigators, Chris Simpson and
Mike Carroll can be contacted for advice on their
direct lines, mobile telephones, or at their e-mail
addresses. Their’ administrator, Debra Little is also
available in assisting to contact the investigators.
Chris Simpson
Mike Carroll
direct line: +44(0) 20 7204 2258
mobile: +44(0) 7860 202028
email: chris.simpson@thomasmiller.com
Chris joined Signum Services in 1997 following a 30
year career as a detective with London’s Metropolitan
Police where he served on the flying squad, regional
crime squad and fraud squad. He specialised in
serious and organised crime.
direct line: +44(0) 20 7204 2257
mobile: +44(0) 7785 722 422
email: michael.carroll@thomasmiller.com
Mike Carroll joined Signum Services on retiring from
the Metropolitan Police in November 2006. He was
a career detective for 30 years, serving in various
departments at New Scotland Yard. He specialised in
serious and organised crime, including the investigation
of armed robberies.
Debra Little
The main Signum contact details are
Signum Services Limited
Tel: +44 207 283 5616
Fax: +44 207 626 8379
Email: signum@thomasmiller.com
direct line: +44(0) 20 7204 2256
email debra.little@thomasmiller.com
Debra has been with Signum Services since 2003
and provides administrative support. Debra also is
the contact person between security seal manufacturers,
the UK Security Seal Teship Authority and UK
Customs.

The investigative arm
Signum Services Ltd is the investigative arm of
Thomas Miller & Co. Ltd and conducts investigations
on behalf of the Members of the UK P&I Club.
Its origins can be traced back to1953, when food
was still being rationed in the UK after World War
II. Thieves had been targeting food supplies being
discharged at London’s docks and thefts of these
cargoes had become a major problem for some of
the P&I Club’s Members. An ex-police officer was
employed to counter these activities.
Signum Services now has two investigators who
travel the world making inquiries into any criminal
activity affecting Club Members. The investigators
are ex-senior detectives from the Criminal Investigation
Department at New Scotland Yard.
They have over 75 years experience in solving
crime and have served on squads specialised in
detecting suspicious deaths, organised crime,
armed robbery, hijacking, kidnapping, fraud and
transport crime.
Their qualifications enable them to enquire into any
incident which a Member may suspect harbours a
criminal aspect. They have been called upon to
investigate murder, arson, many types of fraud,
rape, stowaway related problems, criminal damage,
container and general cargo crime, port organised
crime and every conceivable type of theft.
Signum Services is a unique body in the world of
marine loss investigation.
A typical investigation
professional bodies of which he is a member. All
this may give a fair indication of where the problem
lies before he boards a plane.
Arrangements will be made to interview everyone
involved in the handling or movement of the cargo
in the place where it is believed to have gone
missing. Local agents or correspondents provide
office facilities and the investigator will work closely
with them perhaps for the next week or two. He
may have to work with the state, town or perhaps
the local port police or customs and exise offcers.
The initial request for help usually comes to Signum
from one of the Club’s executives. The problem is
identified and relevant documents are studied. A
high value container or its cargo may have gone
missing somewhere along its six or seven thousand
mile journey across the world.
Preliminary enquiries may be made through the Club’s
network of correspondents or with the Member’s
local agent. The investigator may contact law
enforcement colleagues from one of the international
The investigator must be sensitive to the interests
of the Member. For example, if an investigation at a
port involves common problems experienced by
different Members, each Member is treated as a
separate client and the confidentiality of their
interests is respected accordingly.
With hard work the investigator will return home
having solved the problem. He will then prepare a
detailed report. The cause of the problems will be
explained to the Member and he will be advised of
preventative action which should be taken to avoid
recurrence.

Rags to riches
A shipper arranged transport for two containers
stuffed with cigarettes. At the port of destination they
were stored, unopened, in the terminal for several weeks.
In due course, the consignee requested that they be
returned to the shipper. When the containers arrived
back at the original port of loading only one contained
cigarettes. The other contained rags and old clothing.
The loss was valued at US$250,000.
The Signum investigation showed that terminal staff
had switched the numbers of two containers, one
containing cigarettes and the other containing rags,
whilst stored at the original port of discharge. The
rags container was given the identity of one of the
cigarette units, which in turn received the identity of
the rags container. The consignee of the rags container
then took delivery of the cigarettes exactly as the
thieves had planned.
It also established beyond doubt that the carrier, when
instructed to return the containers to the original
shipper, shipped one container of cigarettes and one
of rags. It was therefore shown that the loss was the
responsibility of the terminal and no claim was ever
submitted against the carrier.
Bar code blues
The consignee of two containers stuffed with cigarettes
arranged for surveyors to ensure that the consignment
should bear particular bar coding. When the cigarettes
were delivered to the consignee, the bar code
suggested a lower grade of cigarette than that ordered.
The Signum investigation revealed that an intermediary
was arranging shipments in the knowledge that the
cigarettes actually supplied by him were of a lower
quality than those ordered. He nevertheless invoiced
his client based on the value of the superior product.
Responsibility for the fraud was shown to be that of
the intermediary.
Copper value reaches ‘rock bottom’
Two separate claims were received by a large Japanese
shipping line for the combined loss of over 1000 tonnes
of copper cathodes valued at about US $8 million.
A total of 53 containers had been shipped from Dar es
Salaam to the two consignees, one in the USA and
one in Korea. When they arrived they were found to
contain worthless rocks and earth.
Signum Services conducted enquiries in Canada, USA,
Korea, Singapore and Dar es Salaam. The shipper in
Dar es Salaam was claiming that the copper had been
stolen during the journey. The investigation clearly
showed that the consignees were acting completely
honestly and there was no possibility of the copper
having been removed anywhere en route.
Further investigations in Dar es Salaam showed that
the surveyors conducting one of the pre-shipment
surveys had been bribed and the other pre-shipment
survey was a forgery. Signum then managed to locate
the place where the containers were stuffed and found
members of staff who recalled loading the container
five months earlier, not with copper cathodes, but with
rocks and earth. One of them had been suspicious at
the time and had decided to take some photographs.
Signum took possession of these photographs, which
clearly show the boxes being stuffed with rocks and
earth. The investigation proved, beyond all doubt, that
the copper was never loaded and did not in fact exist.
Another 30 containers were in the Dar es Salaam
Terminal waiting to be loaded on board a vessel
bound for China. The vessel’s agents refused to
accept them for shipment. The losses would have
amounted to well over US $12 million.
It was then ascertained that there were further
containers in the terminal, allegedly stuffed with copper
by the same shipper, due to be carried by a different
shipping line. That shipping line was warned of the
problem and, as a result, refused to carry them.

Forging ahead
Signum were asked to investigate the release of a
cargo of leather cloth against the production of a
forged bill of lading. The claim was being made by a
representative of the Chinese shipper who still held
the three genuine original bills of lading and who
had not received full payment. He was claiming the
value of his cargo which he said had been wrongly
released by the carrier without the surrender of the
original bills.
The Signum investigator travelled to China where he
interviewed members of the shipping line staff, in
particular, regarding issuing original bills of lading.
He then visited the shipper, who produced what he
said were the original bills of lading he had received
when the cargo went on board.
Again, the Signum investigator centred his questions
on the shipper’s procedures relating to the bills of
lading. It appeared that the three bills in the shipper’s
possession were indeed genuine. It was then
necessary to travel to Mumbai, India and make
further enquiries with the shipping agents and the
consignee.
When the investigator interviewed staff at the shipping
agents, he discovered that the bills of lading which
had been surrendered by the consignee appeared, on
the face of it, to be genuine, but on closer examination
were discovered to be forgeries.
The investigator then went to interview the consignee
at his premises. The consignee agreed that he had
surrendered the bills of lading to the vessel’s agent
and had collected the cargo. He told the investigator
that he had obtained the bills of lading through his
bank and had no idea they were forgeries.
The consignee told the investigator that he had
ordered similar cargo from the same shipper on a
number of occasions and the previous consignment
had been substandard. A dispute relating to this was
in progress; although it was not preventing further
trade between the parties. The consignee had told
the shipper that he was withholding monies due on
the current shipment because the leather cloth he
had ordered and paid for previously was not of a
good quality.
The investigator went to the consignee’s bank in
Mumbai and examined their procedures with regard
to their receiving bills. The bank manager explained
their procedures to the investigator and stated that
the bills had come directly from the shipper’s bank
in China. There were stamps on the forged bills from
both the shipper and the consignee’s banks indicating
that the documents had passed through both
organisations’ hands.
The bank’s register was examined by the investigator
and clearly showed the bills having been properly
registered as arriving from China and being passed
to the consignee. It was therefore proved beyond
any doubt that the forged bills of lading surrendered
by the consignee had been sent to him by the shipper
through the banking system.
The shipper, knowing that because of the dispute he
was not going to be paid in full, had forged bills of
lading and sent them to the consignee. He had
intended that the consignee should unwittingly use
the forged bills and take delivery of the cargo. The
shipper was then claiming his loss through the
shipping line for wrongly releasing the cargo.
The result of the investigation was brought to the
attention of the shipper who immediately dropped
his claim.

Television programme interrupted
A consignment of televisions being shipped from China
to the USA was to be met by a surveyor at a specified
time at the rail terminal gate. This was arranged by the
shipping line as there had been losses of this type of
cargo on previous occasions.
However, further enquiries at the rail terminal revealed
incontrovertible evidence that the truck driver collected
the container and went through the ‘out-gate’ twenty
minutes earlier than the agreed rendezvous time with
the surveyor.
The surveyor was to check the security seal and then
escort the box to the receiver’s premises. However,
on its arrival, the container was found to be empty
and although the seal was intact, a rivet securing the
locking bar handle had been tampered with.
Signum made enquiries in China, at the discharge port
in California and with rail companies involved in the
container’s carriage across the USA. This investigation
showed that there was no opportunity at any point to
steal the cargo.
The surveyor’s report said that he had met the truck
driver at the rail terminal gates at the appointed time
and had waited whilst he went in and collected the
container. When he came back out forty minutes
later, the surveyor inspected the seal and then followed
behind the truck driver on the half hour journey to the
consignee’s warehouse.
There should have been no opportunity for any
tampering of the rivet or for removing the cargo.
The surveyor had said that he had waited forty minutes
after the rendezvous time to carry out the seal and
container inspection, but as the truck driver in fact went
through the ‘out-gate’ twenty minutes earlier than the
agreed rendezvous time, it meant that there was one
hour of unaccounted time at that point.
There was no other unaccounted time at any other
point of the container’s journey between leaving the
TV factory in China and its arrival at the consignee’s
premises.
The surveyor, who had been employed specifically
to escort the container at this point and prevent the
container from being tampered with, had compiled a
false report, implying there was no time for the theft
to have occurred whilst he was accompanying the
driver to the consignee’s premises.
The claim was pursued against the surveyor’s
company.

Under seal
Signum regularly encounters cases where consignees
find a container’s seal intact but all or part of its
contents missing. One case involved shipments of
rubber blocks to Europe and Australia.
The investigation showed that containers left the
shipper’s premises and arrived at the terminal in the
same condition. Good procedures at the terminal,
checking and recording details of seals and times of
arrival, established that the thefts took place at the
shipper’s premises before the containers were sealed.
In another case sportswear was dis-appearing from
containers arriving in the United States. The seals
were correct and intact and it was assumed that the
goods were being removed before the seals were
attached to the containers.
It is essential to check containers promptly and
thoroughly where orginal seals appear intact but
part or all of the contents have been removed. It is
particularly important to examine carefully the bolts
on door hinges and seal brackets to identify any signs
of interference. It can be difficult, costly and time
consuming to try at a later stage to pinpoint where
and when the goods were removed.
The Signum investigation discovered that drivers were
being bribed to take the containers to a warehouse
controlled by the thieves instead of directly to the
port of shipment. Whilst there, bolts were removed
from the doors of the containers allowing access to
the container from which part of the goods were
removed. The remainder of the consignment was
redistributed in the containers, the doors and bolts
restored and the container resumed its journey
arriving at the port with the original seal intact.
Paper losses
Much fraud is conducted with the help of “insiders”.
These people may provide photocopies of documents,
such as bills of lading, which are essential to enable
fraudsters to commit an offence. They may also supply
information which can be entered on forged documents
to secure the release of cargo.
When a driver arrived at a terminal to collect a highvalue
container loaded with spirits he produced a
delivery note which bore the correct bill of lading
number and the correct customs number. The
terminal’s computer identified the detailed information
as correct and generated a release document. The
driver was then able to collect the container and
obtain the necessary endorsements for its release.
In this case the terminal staff failed to cross check
information contained on the relase document against
that contained on the delivery note tendered by the
driver. Had it been checked it would have revealed
sufficient discrepancies between the two documents
to raise suspicions about the validity of the transaction.
Thefts such as this are usually facilitated by poor
procedures or failure to observe sound procedures,
where they exist.
In another case a driver called at a terminal to collect
a high value container. Although the documents in his
possession were forged, they appeared to be genuine
in every respect. Neverthless, he would not have got
away with the container if the staff who released it had
observed some of their own basic security procedures.
The container should have been handed over only to
a driver whose details had been faxed to the terminal
the previous night by the consignee’s agent. Reference
to the fax would have also shown particulars of the
trucking company employed and the reigistration
number of the tractor unit.
In the event no fax was received by the terminal but
the container was still released to the driver of a
bogus trucking company without further inquiry.

Recent & relevant
experience
Signum's extensive experience of responding to
criminal attacks upon shipowners assets and
personnel has covered every sector of shipping and
nearly every major maritime port. In just these past
eighteen months, the Signum team have responded
to the following incidents.
• Fraud involving non existing shipment of copper
- Syria
• Murder of ship's master - Belgium
• Criminal gangs smuggling drugs on container
ships - Caribbean
• Security testing of container seals - UK
• Arson on board cargo vessel - at sea
• Rape of passenger on cruise vessel - at sea
• Suicide of crew member - at sea
• Theft of cargo of computer printer cartridges
- Brazil
• Corruption in wreck removal - Indonesia
• Serious and repeated assaults by male cruise
member on female crew member - at sea
• Fraudulent injury claims by passengers - U.S
• Fraudulent injury claims by crew - Latvia
Get Signum
Signum often carries out security surveys of
terminals and warehouses for Members. The
investiator’s long experience of dealing with
criminals, tells them why, how and where
premises are vulnerable.
Upon requrest an investigator will attend to
examine the physical security of premises and,
equally importantly to assess the effectiveness
of the security procedures adopted in that
location.
Most crime could be prevented by:
• thoroughly vetting staff
• good physical proection of premises, and
• good security procedures which are properly
enforced
Further services provided by Signum include
company searches, asset tracing, ship tracking,
port security and shipboard problems such as
stowaways prevention.
Signum will also advise Members on any loss
prevention matters involving security.
Signum’s greates successes have been in the
detection and prevention of crime against
Members. A call to any of the Club’s offices
will ensure an immediate, confidential and
professional investigation which could save
much time and money.
As Signum Services work directly for the P&I
Club, Members are not charged for any
investigations that are carried out.
Signum Services Limited
Telephone: +44 207 283 5616
Fax: +44 207 626 8379
Email: signum@thomasmiller.com