A court on Wednesday heard recordings of alleged phone calls and messages made by Tammy Caruan to victims of a scam she was participating in.

Victims of the alleged bank scam told a court how the woman accused of orchestrating a widespread fraud scheme convinced them she was calling from their bank's fraud department before draining thousands of euros from their accounts.

She has since been denied bail.

The court heard how victims received text messages appearing to come from their bank number, warning them of suspicious activity on their accounts.

Shortly afterwards, they would receive a phone call from a woman claiming to be a bank representative who would guide them through a process that ultimately allowed access to their finances.

Recording of alleged scam played in court

One of the witnesses, whose father had previously fallen victim to the same scheme, testified that he deliberately recorded a phone call he received after recognising the pattern of the scam.

The recording, which the witness had posted publicly on Facebook in an attempt to warn others, was played in court. During the call, a woman believed to be Caruana is heard instructing the man to retrieve a login code and enter verification details into his bank's mobile application, all stemming from a link sent to the victim, which appeared to be from the bank itself.

At one point in the recording, the witness confronts the caller, telling her: "This is the scam that takes €5,000, like you took from my father and my friends."

The woman replies "No" before the conversation continues briefly, and the woman eventually ends the call abruptly.

The defence argued that the court-ordered anonymity of the witness served little purpose since he had already published the recording publicly. However, the prosecution maintained that the protection should remain in place.

The witness explained that he had intentionally provided false banking details when pressing the link, while keeping his real phone number so that he could expose the scammer. He said he later uploaded the recording to Facebook because the incident had deeply affected his family.

Father describes how he was duped, "I don't know how many times I told her thank you"

The man's father, who was allegedly defrauded last July, also testified in court. The same recording was played to him, and he confirmed that the voices heard were those of his son and the accused.

He explained that shortly after transferring a substantial amount of money from his Bank of Valletta account to his card account, he received a message warning that his account was being tampered with. Moments later, he received a phone call from a woman claiming to be calling from the bank.

According to the witness, the woman asked him about his recent transactions and informed him that suspicious transfers worth thousands of euros were being attempted from his account. To secure the account and block the transactions, she sent him a link and instructed him to enter his banking details.

Only after contacting the bank directly did he realise he had been scammed. By then, €2,300 had already been taken from his account, and another €2,700 transaction was pending.

The man told the court he felt ashamed for falling victim to the scheme.

"I don't know how many times I told her thank you," he said, explaining that he believed the caller was genuinely helping him secure his account. He added that he considered himself cautious about scams but was convinced because the message appeared to come from the bank's official number and the caller spoke in a professional manner.

"She called me three times, by the third, I decided to record her"

Another man testified that he had received several similar calls in February last year.

He said he had been contacted three times. During the first call, he was duped and scammed out of thousands; during the second, he realised it was the same scam and reacted angrily.

By the third call, he decided to record the conversation. In the three phone calls, the woman identified herself as 'Cynthia'.

During the recording played in court, the caller tells him that his bank card had been used on a foreign website and that a transaction of around €2,800 was about to be processed.

"She told me not to worry and that she would stop the transaction for me," the witness said, explaining that he believed he was speaking to someone from the bank's fraud unit.

Shortly after the call ended, he received another call from the bank itself informing him that suspicious transactions had been detected on his account. When he explained that he had already spoken to someone from the bank's fraud department, the bank informed him that he had been scammed.

He told the court the incident had affected him deeply, saying he was unable to eat for a week and had to cancel plans for a family holiday.

Mother's messages handed to the court

Another witness explained that she contacted police after recognising Caruana's name in news reports about the case.

The woman told the court that she realised the accused was the daughter of a friend of hers, whom she had worked for a long time, and she had messaged her on Facebook Messenger about the scams, and about the situation in general. The messages see the witness discussing the situation with Caruana's mother, where she said, "I'm not happy with what she did".

Due to the fact that the witness's daughter was scammed herself, allegedly by Caruana, and after seeing reports that Caruana had pleaded not guilty to the charges, the witness went to the police and handed over the messages and voice recordings she had received, hoping they might assist investigators.

Student victim recounts ordeal whilst on Erasmus

The daughter of the previous witness also testified, explaining that she reported the incident to the police on 20 February 2025.

She said she had first received a text message appearing to come from her bank stating that her card had been hacked from an online shopping website.

Shortly afterwards, she received a phone call from a woman claiming to work in the bank's fraud department, who told her that a suspicious transaction of €2,800 had been attempted.

Believing the call to be genuine, she followed the instructions given to her, which included entering details through a link sent to her phone. The caller reassured her that the transaction had been blocked and that a new bank card would be issued.

By that time, the victim was on Erasmus abroad. She later discovered that the replacement card never arrived.

On 6 March, the bank contacted her to inform her that all the funds in her account had been withdrawn.

The young student told the court that the experience left her distressed and financially stranded in a foreign country.

"I was alone, without access to my money," she said, explaining that she had struggled to deal with the situation while trying to file police reports in a country she barely knew.

The witness was extremely affected by the situation.

Bank official confirms suspicious transactions

A representative from the bank also testified, presenting records showing transactions amounting to around €8,000 connected to one of the victims' accounts.

The witness confirmed that the phone number used to send the fraudulent links did not belong to the bank and that the messages directing victims to external websites were part of the alleged scam operation.

The prosecution was led by Inspector Claire Vella Borg, assisted by lawyers Marica Ciantar and Mauro Abela on behalf of the Attorney General.

Lawyer Stefano Filetti appeared as parte civile for Bank of Valletta plc.

Lawyers Roberto Spiteri and Franco Galea represented the accused.

Magistrate Lara Lanfranco issued the decree.