Watch out for the Modern Day Pirate
by Sue Hewitt, Sunday Herald/Sail-World on 12 Feb 2007
No, they probably didn’t look like this... SW
Think all sailors are pretty nice people? That the days of evil pirates is over? Gino Stocco and his son Mark didn’t – or at least they saw an opportunity. The Sunday Herald reports that the two went on a crime spree for two years along the eastern coast of Australia conning people as they went.
However, Sue Hewitt reports, the father and son's high- seas pirate adventure from NSW to Victoria has landed them behind bars.
The swindling seafarers stole the identities of a priest, a soldier serving in Iraq and acquaintances to finance their high jinx.
Their voyage started in 2003 when Stocco's marriage broke down and he used a $100,000 divorce settlement to buy a yacht. Stocco, 49, and his son, Mark, 27, then conned a luxury lifestyle from people they met in ports along the coastline.
The pair cheated people by using their personal documents to obtain credit cards and mobile phones and to create bank loans. Police say a Christian minister claimed the men befriended him before using his certificate of ordination to assume his identity. Another victim was a soldier, a former neighbour of Gino Stocco, who accumulated traffic fines in his name while the man served in Iraq.
The father and son were jailed this week by Warrnambool magistrate Michael Stone. Gino Stocco was sentenced to four months and one week jail and fined $2400. His son was sentenced to two months jail and fined $600.
Mmmm… from a pirates perspective, maybe the two year spree might have been worth the penalty……? But I guess the moral of the story is –
Don't use sailing shoes as a character reference.
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