60s Betting Scam

Does anyone remember this.
Around the mid 60s my sister lived off Earle Road. A flyer came through the door advertising a "Double Your Money" betting system ran by a "William Corrigan", if I remember correctly. It operated from a makeshift kiosk in one of the corner shops on Earle Road.
It offered that whatever stake you placed, he would gamble it on the horses and the next week you would receive double back. The first week my brother-in-law put ?5 on and the next week he got ?10 back, the next week there were people queuing up to put money on, my mother put ?25 on, a lot of money at the time, and next week NOTHING, Corrigan had done a runner with all the suckers' money.
The shop got smashed up by angry punters and it had nothing to do with the owners, they just let the space out for a few pounds.

Never heard of that one Pete. A fool and his money eh.:PDT_Xtremez_42:

(Great site you got btw:PDT_Piratz_26:)

I remember that, the actual guy who set it up was called Norman Fyne, dunno if that is spelled right. He went into hiding also, then appeared a while later and started a private hire place in Smithdown Rd. called "Yellow Cabs". It was later sold to Liver in Duke St. and I think he was running that, this would be about '67-8. That was the last I heard of him.

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Originally Posted by Stanier

Does anyone remember this.
Around the mid 60s my sister lived off Earle Road. A flyer came through the door advertising a "Double Your Money" betting system ran by a "William Corrigan", if I remember correctly. It operated from a makeshift kiosk in one of the corner shops on Earle Road.
It offered that whatever stake you placed, he would gamble it on the horses and the next week you would receive double back. The first week my brother-in-law put ?5 on and the next week he got ?10 back, the next week there were people queuing up to put money on, my mother put ?25 on, a lot of money at the time, and next week NOTHING, Corrigan had done a runner with all the suckers' money.
The shop got smashed up by angry punters and it had nothing to do with the owners, they just let the space out for a few pounds.

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I remember it well! it would have been prior to 1963. and before you could send any money to the address given, you needed to have a 'card' presumably from a previous investor, these were rather hard to get at first, then 'cleverly' the guy running the scam flooded the area with the cards and lots of people send in money (it was by postal order's), once he had cashed all the orders he disapeared, The owner of the shop, an elderly lady had to suffer all the police investigation and the retribution from irate punters! I never knew if the guy who devised the scheme ever got caught ,

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Originally Posted by Norm NZ

I remember it well! it would have been prior to 1963. and before you could send any money to the address given, you needed to have a 'card' presumably from a previous investor, these were rather hard to get at first, then 'cleverly' the guy running the scam flooded the area with the cards and lots of people send in money (it was by postal order's), once he had cashed all the orders he disapeared, The owner of the shop, an elderly lady had to suffer all the police investigation and the retribution from irate punters! I never knew if the guy who devised the scheme ever got caught ,

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Clever scammer.!!
Ta Norm:PDT11

NormNz,
Fyne did time for it eventually, he got 2 years but I don't know about Corrigan.

He is encased in concrete holding up Churchill Way flyover - citybound.

No I'm not ... Oops :eek: