An ‘international con artist’ who claimed to be a United Nations officer when visiting a Holbeach charity has been jailed in New Zealand.
Joshua Martyn (32) used the surname Yarwood and claimed to be working for the United Nations, New Zealand Police said. He was recently jailed for 15 months.
He had also told the team at Boxes of Hope in Holbeach the same tale when he travelled to Ukraine with its founder Mandy Baxter in June 2022.
The Sunday Times has reported he used a number of charities to build contacts in Ukraine which built up to striking a fake $350m arms deal for fighter jets and helicopters via a company he had set up in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
Martyn stayed with Mandy while in the district and she said he had made no financial gain from the charity.
“All he did was take advantage of us,” she said. “We felt guilty, but he had been approved by the Ukrainian embassy and had all the correct paperwork.”
While he told Boxes of Hope he was an ‘officer’ with the United Nations, when The Voice spoke to him in 2022 he described himself as an ‘emergency coordinator for Ukraine Aid’.
Under his real surname of Martyn, he had been convicted of several incidents of fraud including in 2014 buying an ambulance to pose as a paramedic in his native Sussex.
He was arrested in June this year in Christchurch, New Zealand, after leaving a hotel without paying.
Officers found Martyn had done the same with three other hotels in the country, and police then found his offending had been reported in Greece, Thailand and Cambodia, as well as the UK.
Detective Sergeant Michael Freeman, of New Zealand Police, said: “A few people have likened him to Frank Abagnale, the real-life inspiration for the film Catch Me If You Can.
“The only key difference is that unlike being arrested by the French Police like Abagnale, the man was arrested by us.
“This movie-like scenario doesn’t happen to police often, so it is nice to see an offender be held to account for this type of offending.
“Immigration New Zealand and Interpol are now involved, and it is likely more information will surface.”
In the UK the investigation is being led by The Police Service of Northern Ireland.
A police spokesman said: “The Police Service of Northern Ireland continues to work with our international policing partners as we investigate a number of reported fraud offences.”
