Playboy Fraudster who spent £140k at Amika..?

A playboy fraudster who conned banks out of £1.6million running a credit card cloning factory has been jailed for five years.

When fraud squad detectives battered down his door, Eamon Zada, panicked and tossed hundreds of credit cards out of his fifth-floor window.

The 27-year-old had enjoyed huge spending sprees with the stolen cash, racking up a £140,000 nightclub bill and buying the world's most expensive phone.

On his arrest he told detectives: 'I've had enough' and owned up to his role in the huge scam.

When police searched his Notting Hill flat they found a highly sophisticated device which intercepts credit card details from phones.

It is only the second time the gadget has been found in Britain.

Judge Gregory Stone told Zada at Southwark Crown Court: 'This is a bad case of dishonesty. This was a credit card finishing factory involving very sophisticated equipment to fund an extravagant lifestyle.

'You very much enjoyed the fruits of this criminal activity.' Southwark Crown Court heard police raided Zada's council flat following a tip-off.

Robert Povall, prosecuting said: 'He had four metal locks on a metal framed door. It took the police several minutes to ram their way inside.

'Zada was throwing credit cards out of the window and desperately trying to put others into a shredding machine.'

Police searched his flat to find 300 cards and the details of another 3,000 on his Apple Mac - which was also paid for by the cloned cards.

Mr Povall went on: 'Overall, the loss to banking institutions was £1.64m, with American Express losing £1.3m.

'This money was used to fund his lifestyle with holidays, hiring cars, visits to the Ivy, Halfords, Curry's and on one night spending £140,000 at Amika nightclub in Kensington.

'When he was arrested he was wearing a £4,000 Rolex. He also used the cards to buy a Vertu phone for £4,900.'

Detectives found pictures of Zada and his friends swigging Cristal Champagne and smoking cigars.

One snap was called: 'Big in the game.' Other pictures showed the decadent conman pouring bubbly on the floor.

He used high-tech contraptions that his team would stick underneath cash registers across London.

Once the details had been returned to him, Zada used the numbers to make new cards.

Defending him, Robert Berg told the court that Zada aspired to the easy criminal lifestyle.

He said: 'Although he did not go into this venture blindly, there is no doubt he had been attracted by the sort of lifestyle he had seen other more sophisticated criminals lead.

'They had been able to amuse themselves in any way they wanted with unauthorised credit cards. It became a way of life for him against a bland, unskilled background.

'He is taking the rap for other people who were more deeply and extensively involved than he was.

'An operation of this degree of sophistication would have involved several other people.

'He was tempted by the spoils of crime but he has learnt that the fruits of dishonesty are short term and result in prison.'

Zada, of Grenfell Road, Notting Hill, west London, admitted conspiracy to steal between January 1 and June 16. He was sentenced on Friday.

He has previous convictions for fraud after he and a group of friends went on a £25,000 spending free with cloned cards in Stafford.