Harry Potter stuntman is victim of banking scam

David Holmes and Daniel Radcliffe have been close friends since the first Harry Potter film

A former stuntman who became paralysed on a Harry Potter film set said he felt "shame, regret and a whole lot of pain" after falling victim to a telephone scam.

David Holmes, from Leigh-on-Sea, Essex, said "a lot of money" had been stolen from his bank account.

The 41-year-old had been called by a person purporting to be from NatWest who had all of his personal details.

A NatWest Group spokesperson said: “The safety and security of our customers is our top priority."

In a post on Instagram, Mr Holmes said it was "so easy to fall victim to these criminals".

Mr Holmes suffered a spinal injury during filming for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 in January 2009.

Daniel Radcliffe later produced a HBO documentary about Mr Holmes, who was his stunt double, that was released in November 2023.

Mr Holmes said the money stolen from his bank account was "unrecoverable"

Mr Holmes said he had been under "unbelievable amounts of pressure" since the production came out.

"I've just been hit and hit and hit - and [last week] I got the hardest hit of them all," he said.

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Mr Holmes explained the scammer was "very sophisticated" and had a convincing amount of information to give the impression they were legitimate.

"I duly followed all of his instructions, turns out he was a scammer," he said.

'Unrecoverable'

The former stuntman said despite his "heavy heart", he wanted to create a "positive" scenario by raising awareness of the scam.

He said he had been contacted by someone pretending to be from a fraud prevention team at NatWest.

The money that had been taken was "unrecoverable", Mr Holmes added.

In a statement, the NatWest spokesperson said it "continually" assessed advancements in the ways scammers operated.

"It’s important to pause before making any payments at the request of others which might appear unusual," they added.