Recently launched, the Fraud Women’s Network (FWN).
More than 170, from the public and private sector, attended. Speakers at the event at the Chartered Accountants’ Hall, London included the network’s chairwoman Toni Sless; Rosalind Wright, chairman of the Fraud Advisory Panel and FWN patron; Det Insp Phil Butler of Northumbria Police and vice-chair of the North East Fraud Forum; Allison Clare, barrister at Chambers of David Etherington QC; Karen Briggs, partner in KPMG LLP, Head of Financial Sector Forensic in the UK; Alex Ford, CEO of The Eve Appeal (a charity FWN are affiliated with); and DC Martina McGrillen, City of London Police economic crime department.
Planned events
Planned events include a quiz presented by Ron Warmington, director of investigations at GE Consumer Finance; and a June 5 talk on handbag counterfeiting by The Anti-Counterfeiting Group and the Federation Against Copyright Theft, besides updates on the Fraud Act and other topics. Events at first will be in London, but the group hopes to hold events in regional cities. As the network puts it, any woman who works in the anti-fraud arena will know that it can sometimes be a rather male environment, in which there are few senior female executives. Hence the network, to bring together women involved in fraud prevention, detection, investigation and prosecution, to share best practice.
On board
Toni Sless recently joined Bank of America, NA as an investigator, based in London Docklands. She also provides in-house fraud awareness training. Previously she worked at GE Consumer Finance where she was the Global Project Leader and manager of a team which set up a Global Case Management System (‘Garrison’) for the Global Investigations and Security Team. FWN directors are Katy Worobec, Head of Fraud Control at APACS, the UK payments association; Jackie Barwell, the Director of Fraud Management for Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) at payments processor First Data International (FDI); Judith Halliwell, director of The Conference Network, and Development Officer for the Institute of Money Laundering Prevention Officers (IMLPO); and Caroline Shergold, who manages the Corporate Investigation and Due Diligence Functions at the Bank of America.
Steering committee
FWN steering committee members are Shelley Palmer of MasterCard, who previously managed the fraud and operations department at Switch; and who earlier worked as a fraud analyst in the Birmingham area for Document Evidence and the West Midlands Police Fraud Squad; and two City of London Police officers, Det Sgt Jane Moore and Detective Constable Martina McGrillen. As Toni Sless told Professional Security, the women’s network is itself part of a network of organisations: the regional fraud forums, which are coming together in a National Federation of Fraud Forums. The Yorkshire and Humber Fraud Forum featured in our January print issue.
