It was the very last thing I used to be anticipating as I sat in my workplace late one night.

I had been utilizing some new facial recognition software program, seeing how properly it labored.

I put a photograph of Craig Arch – the CEO of Cask Whisky Ltd, the multi-million-pound worldwide award-wining cask whisky enterprise – into the software program.

I wasn’t anticipating to get a lot however I could not have been extra flawed.

There, in entrance of me, was a police mugshot.

The articles linked to the picture advised of a £6.2m fraud with tons of of victims.

And the person behind it was the one staring again at me.

I’ve spent years investigating critical criminals. From human traffickers and gunrunners to contract killers and cocaine smugglers. One factor I by no means thought I would find yourself investigating was whisky.

BBC Producer Liam McDougall advised me of a supply he had – a whistleblower – who mentioned that organised crime had infiltrated the whisky business, that he had compiled a hitlist of suspect whisky funding corporations, and would we be all in favour of trying into it?

A type of on the checklist was an organization referred to as Cask Whisky Ltd.

It was arrange in 2021 and, in its first 12 months of buying and selling, it reported a multi-million-pound turnover.

It boasted of operations in Hong Kong, and it was profitable awards.

The CEO was a person referred to as Craig Arch.

In interviews, he spoke of opening model new headquarters and doubling their workers within the first twelve months.

He additionally advised of their ambitions for the longer term, and mentioned he was “excited for what the subsequent few years will deliver”.

It was solely after I put his photograph into the face recognition software program, that I found the surprising fact behind the person.

His actual title is Craig Brooks. He was jailed in 2019 for his half in a £6.2m funding rip-off. The 350 victims have been primarily aged.

He had come out of jail, modified his look, modified his title to Arch, and arrange Cask Whisky Ltd.

Disqualified from being a director, he put his fiancé – an eyebrow technician from Essex – down on the paperwork because the boss.

I spoke to traders who had handed over tens of hundreds to Craig Arch and his gang, believing they have been shopping for the perfect of whisky, in casks, which might give them returns of 13% or extra.

But the traders found that most of the casks that they had purchased, had both been closely overpriced – as much as 5 occasions in some instances – or did not exist in any respect.

Little did they know that that they had, the truth is, been handing over their cash to a convicted fraudster.

A person disqualified from being a director. A person who was mendacity as to who he was.

I wished to catch Craig Brooks within the act, however no sooner had I began trying into Cask Whisky Ltd, than the corporate disappeared.

It was beneath investigation by the Metropolis of London Police for alleged fraud.

I had missed my probability.

And but, it appeared, no-one knew that Craig Arch wasn’t Craig Arch. That he was actually Craig Brooks, a convicted fraudster.

My probability to reveal this got here after I observed a brand new whisky firm coming to the fore – Cask Spirits International.

Instantly the crimson flags went up.

The branding regarded related. The social media photos I would seen earlier than.

After I checked the historical past of the corporate title on Fb, it was there in black and white. It was Cask Whisky Ltd.

Had Brooks merely arrange yet one more firm? Was he already again on the hunt for potential traders?

Seeing this as my probability, I despatched Cask Spirits International an e mail, pretending to be an asset administration marketing consultant who was representing a rich shopper eager to put money into whisky.

Inside minutes of sending it, I acquired a reply. From a person referred to as Hutchins. Craig Hutchins. It was an excessive amount of of a coincidence.

Though I believed this to be Craig Brooks, I needed to show it.

No investor I spoke to had ever met the person in particular person.

All of the financials have been performed by e mail.

However with the lure of a possible big-money deal, it wasn’t lengthy earlier than a gathering was organized.

A number of weeks later and I arrived on the Westminster workplace of Cask Spirits International.

Strolling into the room, I got here face-to-face with a person I had come to know properly.

I had been taking a look at his picture for months now, had been investigating his ways which had price traders tens of millions, and had been monitoring his each transfer.

It was Craig Brooks.

And right here he was, now pretending to be the managing director of yet one more firm. Beneath yet one more title.

Alongside him have been two members of his gang, each of whom had labored for Cask Whisky Ltd – the corporate beneath investigation by the police.

And each of them have been now additionally utilizing false names.

Through the secret assembly, Brooks advised me he had 11,000 purchasers throughout Europe, constructed up over a seven-year whisky profession.

“The youngest is nineteen,” he advised me. “The oldest is about 92.”

As for the scale of his enterprise, he mentioned: “I’ve acquired contracts with all of the warehouses in Scotland.

“The vast majority of purchasers, they begin small and so, wherever between £3,000 and £50,000.

“So, I believe my largest commerce is £1.4m. We will obtain any quantity as much as £4m with out notifying the financial institution.”

He advised me there was no mark-up on the casks they purchased for traders, and so they solely made cash down the road from the sale of these casks.

Brooks then proceeded to present me a listing of casks for my shopper to purchase – totalling virtually £1.5m.

I confirmed the checklist to a number of business consultants, who mentioned they have been closely overpriced – in some instances, as much as ten occasions the actual worth.

As for the corporate, he ran it, he mentioned, and all monetary choices have been made by him.

“We’re in protected arms?” I requested him.

“Yeah. 100%.” he mentioned.

After I confronted him a number of weeks later, he admitted his actual title was Brooks, however mentioned all of the whisky he had beforehand offered existed, and that he hadn’t been jailed for fraud, however for unfair enterprise practices.

The 2 colleagues who have been additionally utilizing false names, mentioned that they had merely been utilizing names given to them once they joined the brand new firm.

Throughout my eight-month investigation into the whisky commerce, I met so many traders with heart-breaking tales of dropping all that they had.

And I found the callous ways that criminals have been utilizing to take it from them.

If there was one lesson I took away from it, it was this: in case you are pondering of investing in cask whisky, do your homework – as a result of not all people is who they are saying they’re.

Police are investigating three Scotch whisky corporations over fraud allegations, with investments working into the tens of millions.