Latest news with #StrangeButTrueCrime
Sunday World
11-06-2025
- Sunday World
Infamous dine-and-dash couple caught after CCTV ‘went viral'
Bernard and Ann McDonagh were jailed last year for fraud following their brazen scam An infamous Co Mayo dine-and-dash couple were caught after CCTV footage of their crime went viral, police in Wales have said. Bernard McDonagh (41), and wife Ann (39), with addresses in Sandfields, Port Talbot, hit the headlines in the UK after they admitted to a spree of 'dine and dash' thefts in south Wales where they live. The couple, who pleaded guilty to five joint charges of fraud, both hail from Ballyhaunis, Co Mayo. Now, South Wales Police Inspector Andrew Hedley has said that footage of their crime 'exploded' on social media, resulting in their arrest. "There was a huge outcry over what these people were doing," he told BBC's Strange But True Crime podcast. "There was a need to collectively bring this together under one umbrella and get a grip of it really quickly, before it escalated. "It was a brazen disregard for the law." The couple went viral after a furious restaurateur posted CCTV images of the McDonaghs and their party of eight fleeing his trendy Italian eatery after failing to pay a hefty bill. One video had 12 million views in less than a month as a campaign took hold to bring the dine-and-dashers to book. Restaurants had reported the couple turning up with a family group ordering food and drinks and leaving one or two people behind to pay the bill. The card would be declined, and they would offer to go back to their vehicle to get another card or to an ATM for cash — but then disappear. Ann and Bernard McDonagh were caught after scamming Welsh restaurants out of more than £1,000 The scams left some of the small local businesses 'devastated' as the bills left unpaid ranged up to Stg£300. Swansea Crown Court previously heard the pair, who used more than 40 aliases and 18 dates of birth between them, dishonestly obtained food and drink at four restaurants and one takeaway in the south Wales area, with the unpaid bills totalling £1,168.10. Bernard and Ann McDonagh Ann McDonagh also admitted four counts of shoplifting, including at designer store Tommy Hilfiger, taking items worth £1, In May 2024, Ann was sentenced to 12 months in prison and Bernard to eight months, after a judge told them their actions had been motivated by 'pure and utter greed'. Judge Paul Thomas told them: 'From the autumn of last year to spring of this year, you two set out on a deliberate course of sustained dishonesty. 'You would go to restaurants with your own family. You would have food and drink served to you to the value of hundreds of pounds and then you would cynically and brazenly leave without paying. Bernard and Ann McDonagh News in 90 Seconds - June 11th 'You would order the most expensive items on the menu such as steaks in the full knowledge that you had no intention whatsoever of paying for them.' The judge said that using children to wait in the restaurants, who would then run off while pretending to go to a cashpoint, was 'ruthlessly exploitative'. The McDonaghs pleaded guilty to five counts of fraud over their dine and dash escapades, totalling £1,168. Mrs McDonagh also admitted to shoplifting £1,017 in goods from Tommy Hilfiger, Sainsbury's and Tesco, and obstructing a police officer. The court heard that the couple both had previous convictions for fraud.
Irish Independent
11-06-2025
- Irish Independent
Infamous dine-and-dash couple from Co Mayo caught after CCTV footage ‘went viral'
Bernard McDonagh (41), and wife Ann (39), with addresses in Sandfields, Port Talbot, hit the headlines in the UK after they admitted to a spree of 'dine and dash' thefts in south Wales where they live. The couple, who pleaded guilty to five joint charges of fraud, both hail from Ballyhaunis, Co Mayo. Now, South Wales Police Inspector Andrew Hedley has said that footage of their crime 'exploded' on social media, resulting in their arrest. "There was a huge outcry over what these people were doing," he told BBC's Strange But True Crime podcast. "There was a need to collectively bring this together under one umbrella and get a grip of it really quickly, before it escalated. "It was a brazen disregard for the law." The couple went viral after a furious restaurateur posted CCTV images of the McDonaghs and their party of eight fleeing his trendy Italian eatery after failing to pay a hefty bill. One video had 12 million views in less than a month as a campaign took hold to bring the dine-and-dashers to book. Restaurants had reported the couple turning up with a family group ordering food and drinks and leaving one or two people behind to pay the bill. The card would be declined, and they would offer to go back to their vehicle to get another card or to an ATM for cash — but then disappear. The scams left some of the small local businesses 'devastated' as the bills left unpaid often came to hundreds of pounds. ADVERTISEMENT Swansea Crown Court previously heard the pair, who used more than 40 aliases and 18 dates of birth between them, dishonestly obtained food and drink at four restaurants and one takeaway in the south Wales area, with the unpaid bills totalling £1,168.10. Ann McDonagh also admitted four counts of shoplifting, including at designer store Tommy Hilfiger, taking items worth £1,017.60. In May 2024, Ann was sentenced to 12 months in prison and Bernard to eight months, after a judge told them their actions had been motivated by 'pure and utter greed'. Judge Paul Thomas told them: 'From the autumn of last year to spring of this year, you two set out on a deliberate course of sustained dishonesty. 'You would go to restaurants with your own family. You would have food and drink served to you to the value of hundreds of pounds and then you would cynically and brazenly leave without paying. 'You would order the most expensive items on the menu such as steaks in the full knowledge that you had no intention whatsoever of paying for them.' The judge said that using children to wait in the restaurants, who would then run off while pretending to go to a cashpoint, was 'ruthlessly exploitative'. The McDonaghs pleaded guilty to five counts of fraud over their dine and dash escapades, totalling £1,168. Mrs McDonagh also admitted to shoplifting £1,017 in goods from Tommy Hilfiger, Sainsbury's and Tesco, and obstructing a police officer. The court heard that the couple both had previous convictions for fraud.
Yahoo
20-05-2025
- Yahoo
Nicholas Rossi: How the mask slipped during US fugitive's court saga
I first met Nicholas Rossi - or Arthur Knight, as he insisted on being called - in February 2022 in a corridor at Edinburgh Sheriff Court. He was there to fight extradition to the US, where he was accused of rape. Sitting in his electric wheelchair, dressed in a three-piece suit and sporting a wide brimmed hat, the raspy voice behind the oxygen mask was telling anyone who would listen that this was all a terrible misunderstanding. His hands, meanwhile, were hoovering up reporters' business cards. Rossi's departure that day set the tone for what became a familiar scene - a slapstick performance in front of the cameras during which he tipped his wheelchair onto the pavement while trying to manoeuvre into a waiting taxi. Later that evening an unknown number flashed up on my mobile phone and I heard that same raspy voice. "Hello Steven, it's Arthur… do you have a minute?" And so began an exercise in separating fact from fiction that continues three years later, which I have explored in a new podcast as part of the Strange But True Crime series on BBC Sounds. The name Nicholas Rossi first came to wider attention in December 2021 when he was arrested on the Covid ward of a Glasgow hospital. Staff had recognised his mugshot and distinctive tattoos from an Interpol wanted notice. The problem for the American authorities was that the man they were seeking to extradite swore blind he was the victim of mistaken identity. He claimed he was Arthur Knight, an Irish-born orphan who had never been to America - and said he could prove it. A couple of weeks after our first phone-call, "Arthur" was sitting opposite me in a BBC studio, his wife Miranda by his side, telling his tale for the cameras. He said he grew up in care in Dublin and escaped to London as a teenager. There, he sold books with his friends at Camden market, like Del Boy from the comedy Only Fools and Horses. Years later he married Miranda in Bristol before they moved to Glasgow. He showed me their marriage certificate - accompanied by a special licence from the Anglican Church, because "I wouldn't lie to the Archbishop of Canterbury". What he couldn't produce was a birth certificate. Or a passport. He was vague about his schooldays and couldn't say what happened to his old friends. At times the conversation veered as wildly as his accent – from claims he survived the London Tube bombing (he got the date wrong) to a story about once meeting Del Boy's sidekick Rodney. He repeatedly denied being Nicholas Rossi, but when I asked about tattoos he said he was "too tired" to show me his arms. It was a surreal, unconvincing performance that was being watched across the Atlantic by plenty of people who recognised the main character. "I'd know those hands anywhere," Mary Grebinski later told me. She'd been a college student in 2008 when Nicholas Rossi sexually assaulted her on the way to class. He was convicted and placed on the sex offenders register. In Dayton, Ohio – the city where that attack happened – I also spoke to Rossi's ex-wife. Kathryn Heckendorn said she had bought him the red silk pyjamas "Arthur" had been filmed wearing outside court. Their unhappy marriage lasted eight months. The judge who granted their divorce in 2016 said Rossi was guilty of "gross neglect of duty and cruelty" on account of his abusive behaviour. Conversations like this helped fill in the blanks. Nicholas Rossi was born Nicholas Alahverdian in 1987. Rossi was the name of his stepfather, who at the time was Rhode Island's premiere Engelbert Humperdinck impersonator. As a teenager he spent time in care and, years later, enjoyed a degree of local fame as a child welfare campaigner. When reports of Alahverdian's death emerged in 2020, politicians paid tribute from the floor of the Rhode Island State House. According to an online obituary his last words were: "Fear not and run towards the bliss of the sun." But it didn't take long for this deception to begin unravelling. A priest who had been asked to arrange a memorial mass was warned by a detective not to go ahead because "Nicholas isn't dead". Instead, the authorities suspected Rossi was somewhere in the UK, having fled after discovering that the FBI were investigating an alleged credit card fraud. It was his online footprint that ultimately led police to his hospital bedside in Glasgow – ironically as the fugitive was recovering from a genuine near-death experience in the shape of Covid. At one of his early extradition hearings the sheriff commented that advancing the case shouldn't be "rocket science". But the legal process dragged on and on – in large part due to Rossi's antics. There were rambling courtroom monologues, questionable medical episodes and theatrical outbursts which were often directed at his own lawyers as a prelude to sacking them. Sitting in the public gallery, it was rarely dull. Rossi's claim that a corrupt hospital employee called Patrick tattooed him while he was in a coma was one of the more memorable exchanges. In the end the sheriff's conclusion was that the Arthur Knight charade was "implausible" and "fanciful". And yet Rossi stuck to his story – even as his extradition was approved and High Court judges refused his appeal. He stuck to his story as US Marshalls bundled him onto a private jet and as prison guards booked him into the Utah County jail. He stuck to his story in a Utah courtroom, until suddenly he didn't. In October last year I tuned in to a routine bail hearing online when, without warning, the posh English persona disappeared. Speaking in a clear American accent he told the judge he was born Nicholas Alahverdian before his name changed to Rossi. As he claimed to have hidden his identity to escape "death threats", I found myself wondering why he'd chosen that specific moment for the mask to slip. The saga continues, but the novelty has worn off. The intrigue and farce has been stripped away while the serious allegations remain. In May, Nicholas Rossi is due to face the first of two separate rape trials. He denies all the charges.
Yahoo
20-05-2025
- Yahoo
Nicholas Rossi: How the mask slipped during US fugitive's court saga
I first met Nicholas Rossi - or Arthur Knight, as he insisted on being called - in February 2022 in a corridor at Edinburgh Sheriff Court. He was there to fight extradition to the US, where he was accused of rape. Sitting in his electric wheelchair, dressed in a three-piece suit and sporting a wide brimmed hat, the raspy voice behind the oxygen mask was telling anyone who would listen that this was all a terrible misunderstanding. His hands, meanwhile, were hoovering up reporters' business cards. Rossi's departure that day set the tone for what became a familiar scene - a slapstick performance in front of the cameras during which he tipped his wheelchair onto the pavement while trying to manoeuvre into a waiting taxi. Later that evening an unknown number flashed up on my mobile phone and I heard that same raspy voice. "Hello Steven, it's Arthur… do you have a minute?" And so began an exercise in separating fact from fiction that continues three years later, which I have explored in a new podcast as part of the Strange But True Crime series on BBC Sounds. The name Nicholas Rossi first came to wider attention in December 2021 when he was arrested on the Covid ward of a Glasgow hospital. Staff had recognised his mugshot and distinctive tattoos from an Interpol wanted notice. The problem for the American authorities was that the man they were seeking to extradite swore blind he was the victim of mistaken identity. He claimed he was Arthur Knight, an Irish-born orphan who had never been to America - and said he could prove it. A couple of weeks after our first phone-call, "Arthur" was sitting opposite me in a BBC studio, his wife Miranda by his side, telling his tale for the cameras. He said he grew up in care in Dublin and escaped to London as a teenager. There, he sold books with his friends at Camden market, like Del Boy from the comedy Only Fools and Horses. Years later he married Miranda in Bristol before they moved to Glasgow. He showed me their marriage certificate - accompanied by a special licence from the Anglican Church, because "I wouldn't lie to the Archbishop of Canterbury". What he couldn't produce was a birth certificate. Or a passport. He was vague about his schooldays and couldn't say what happened to his old friends. At times the conversation veered as wildly as his accent – from claims he survived the London Tube bombing (he got the date wrong) to a story about once meeting Del Boy's sidekick Rodney. He repeatedly denied being Nicholas Rossi, but when I asked about tattoos he said he was "too tired" to show me his arms. It was a surreal, unconvincing performance that was being watched across the Atlantic by plenty of people who recognised the main character. "I'd know those hands anywhere," Mary Grebinski later told me. She'd been a college student in 2008 when Nicholas Rossi sexually assaulted her on the way to class. He was convicted and placed on the sex offenders register. In Dayton, Ohio – the city where that attack happened – I also spoke to Rossi's ex-wife. Kathryn Heckendorn said she had bought him the red silk pyjamas "Arthur" had been filmed wearing outside court. Their unhappy marriage lasted eight months. The judge who granted their divorce in 2016 said Rossi was guilty of "gross neglect of duty and cruelty" on account of his abusive behaviour. Conversations like this helped fill in the blanks. Nicholas Rossi was born Nicholas Alahverdian in 1987. Rossi was the name of his stepfather, who at the time was Rhode Island's premiere Engelbert Humperdinck impersonator. As a teenager he spent time in care and, years later, enjoyed a degree of local fame as a child welfare campaigner. When reports of Alahverdian's death emerged in 2020, politicians paid tribute from the floor of the Rhode Island State House. According to an online obituary his last words were: "Fear not and run towards the bliss of the sun." But it didn't take long for this deception to begin unravelling. A priest who had been asked to arrange a memorial mass was warned by a detective not to go ahead because "Nicholas isn't dead". Instead, the authorities suspected Rossi was somewhere in the UK, having fled after discovering that the FBI were investigating an alleged credit card fraud. It was his online footprint that ultimately led police to his hospital bedside in Glasgow – ironically as the fugitive was recovering from a genuine near-death experience in the shape of Covid. At one of his early extradition hearings the sheriff commented that advancing the case shouldn't be "rocket science". But the legal process dragged on and on – in large part due to Rossi's antics. There were rambling courtroom monologues, questionable medical episodes and theatrical outbursts which were often directed at his own lawyers as a prelude to sacking them. Sitting in the public gallery, it was rarely dull. Rossi's claim that a corrupt hospital employee called Patrick tattooed him while he was in a coma was one of the more memorable exchanges. In the end the sheriff's conclusion was that the Arthur Knight charade was "implausible" and "fanciful". And yet Rossi stuck to his story – even as his extradition was approved and High Court judges refused his appeal. He stuck to his story as US Marshalls bundled him onto a private jet and as prison guards booked him into the Utah County jail. He stuck to his story in a Utah courtroom, until suddenly he didn't. In October last year I tuned in to a routine bail hearing online when, without warning, the posh English persona disappeared. Speaking in a clear American accent he told the judge he was born Nicholas Alahverdian before his name changed to Rossi. As he claimed to have hidden his identity to escape "death threats", I found myself wondering why he'd chosen that specific moment for the mask to slip. The saga continues, but the novelty has worn off. The intrigue and farce has been stripped away while the serious allegations remain. In May, Nicholas Rossi is due to face the first of two separate rape trials. He denies all the charges.
Yahoo
13-05-2025
- Yahoo
How viral CCTV exposed serial 'dine-and-dash' couple
Imagine ordering T-bone steaks and desserts at a family-run restaurant, racking up a bill of hundreds of pounds, before legging it without paying a penny. Well, married couple Bernard and Ann McDonagh got away with doing this time and time again, dine-and-dashing to the value of more than £1,000 at five different restaurants. They had a brazen plan which they would act out each time, even involving their children. That was until last year, when a CCTV image of the couple shared by one of the affected restaurants on Facebook went viral, and justice caught up with them. Dine-and-dash couple jailed and fined Dine and dash couple hit my pizzeria, says owner Dine-and-dash couple failed to pay £1,000 in bills Speaking to the BBC's Strange But True Crime podcast, South Wales Police Inspector Andrew Hedley recalled how the CCTV social media post "exploded". "There was a huge outcry over what these people were doing," said Insp Hedley. "There was a need to collectively bring this together under one umbrella and get a grip of it really quickly, before it escalated. "It was a brazen disregard for the law." Mr and Mrs McDonagh, from Sandfields in Port Talbot, first targeted a restaurant called The River House in Swansea in August 2023. They ordered the most expensive items on the menu, running up a bill of £267, before running off without paying. They got away with it that time - or so they thought - and went on to target Golden Fortune in Port Talbot, La Casona in Skewen and Isabella's in Porthcawl. Then, in April 2024, the couple visited the newly-opened restaurant Bella Ciao in Swansea. They ordered T-bone steaks and double pudding portions, racking up a bill of £329, before - once again - leaving without paying. The restaurant's owners, who at the time described the situation as "destroying", reported what happened to the police and shared a CCTV image of the couple on Facebook. The post gained enormous attention and social media sleuths started their own investigations, putting pressure on police who confirmed they were investigating the couple over "a number of reports of making off without payment from several businesses". Within days, the couple were arrested and in May 2024 they pleaded guilty to failing to pay restaurant bills. Mrs McDonagh was jailed for 12 months while her husband was jailed for eight months. But how had they managed to get away with it for so long? The duo had a carefully practised plan which was boldly repeated at every restaurant. Mr McDonagh would leave the restaurant first with other family members, while one child would be left behind with Mrs McDonagh to pay the bill. When she would try to pay the card would be declined, and so she would offer to go to a cashpoint and leave the child at the restaurant as "proof" she would return. But the children were trained to be part of the plan, and seconds later they would run off too. At Swansea Crown Court, Mrs McDonagh also admitted to thefts from supermarkets and obstructing or resisting a police officer. The court heard she had even lied about being pregnant to get out of custody. Judge Paul Thomas KC described Mrs McDonagh as a "prolific liar". The question asked by many was why the couple did what they did. The court heard Mrs McDonagh may have been "trying to make herself feel better" following family bereavements. Mr McDonagh's defence barrister said the father-of-six was "deeply embarrassed and ashamed". But Judge Thomas said they were motivated by "pure and utter greed". "Over a period of around eight months, you two set out on a deliberate course of sustained dishonesty," he told the court. "You would go into restaurants with your young family, you would have food and drink served to you, on the value of hundreds of pounds, then you would cynically leave without paying." The use of their children was "ruthlessly exploitative," the judge added, describing the incidents as "carefully pre-planned to a specific pattern" and "criminality for criminality's sake". Woman who lied to get nursing job jailed How two friends found £3m treasure and ended up in jail The GP poisoner: A tale of the unexpected
