George Steen ran a fraudulent "commercial loans" business from his Darlington office. He advertised loans in the US/Canadian and the Australian/New Zealand press to small business ventures that found it difficult to obtain conventional bank financing or was simply attracted by Steen's low interest rates even on very large sums borrowed.
Applicants to Steen's loans believed that he, operating under the title of Peninsular Holdings Overseas Inc, had access to considerable overseas loan funds. Loan applications came in from abroad for a variety of projects such as a golf course development and a holiday complex.
Initial handling of the applications was done by two of Steen's associates operating as Corporate Advances in Brighton. Advance fees were required for initial assessment of applications. All of them would be "approved" but more money was then requested for processing to the next stage with Peninsular Holdings which would again at a further stage impose more financial conditions.
There were in fact no loan funds available. The number of stages requiring increasing advance payments were simply part of the scheme to leach money from people who would ultimately baulk at paying more, pull out and forfeit their non-returnable deposits.
The fraud was deliberately aimed at English speaking countries, but not UK/Ireland. People in other countries considered less likely to seek redress in an unfamiliar jurisdiction. But one Canadian victim came to the UK to complain. The resulting investigation and trial resulted in the conviction of Steen and his associates.
