A con artist from Dudley, West Midlands, has been sentenced to nearly two years in prison after being found guilty of a cross-Atlantic tractor scam worth over £130,000. Augustin-Paul Ciceu, 52, was operating a transport company that initially agreed to ship a tractor from Europe to Canada in March 2020.
Ciceu, who used the alias “Gus” in business transactions, seized the opportunity to scam the Canadian buyer. He offered two additional tractors for sale, claiming that all three would be shipped together. However, the tractors were never sent, and investigations later confirmed that Ciceu had neither shipped the equipment nor even owned the tractors he had promised to sell.
To deceive the buyer, Ciceu sent a video showing tractors that belonged to someone else, which further strengthened his fraudulent claims. Police discovered that the tractors had never left the UK, and Ciceu was found guilty of theft and two counts of fraud by false representation.
At Wolverhampton Crown Court on November 8, Ciceu was sentenced to 1 year and 9 months in prison. Authorities are now working to recover his ill-gotten gains under the Proceeds of Crime Act (POCA).
DC Ash Forster, who led the investigation, described the case as complex, explaining that the team worked closely with the Canadian victim, who traveled to the UK for the trial. Forster emphasized that law enforcement would continue to pursue justice and hold criminals accountable.