LONDON: A British businessman was convicted of fraud yesterday after making millions of dollars selling fake bomb-detection equipment based on a golf-ball finder to countries around the world, endangering rather than protecting lives there.
James McCormick, 56, manufactured and sold the hand-held “ADE 651” devices to countries at serious risk from bombings such as Iraq, claiming they could detect explosives, drugs and other substances.
But the detectors had no working components, lacked any basis in science and did not work in accordance with the known laws of physics, London’s Old Bailey court heard.
“James McCormick is a conman,” said Detective Superintendent Nigel Rock of Avon and Somerset Police outside court.
UK millionaire faces jail over fake detectors
