Police Cripple International Scam Syndicate In Malaysia

I am new here and I have gone through scamwarners.com and noticed that there are many Nigerians scammers operating from Malaysia. Whether we have fallen to their tricks or lucky to spot them earlier, I believe all of us wonder if the scammers are ever get busted.

Here are some news from Malaysia newspaper and hope these will educate us on their modus operandi.

SABAH, June 10, 2011 - Malaysian police have busted an international syndicate during a raid on a condominium in Kota Kinabalu, the capital of Sabah state on Borneo island. A total of 37 Chinese and Taiwanese nationals were reportedly arrested during the raid.

The syndicate was reportedly activating in Taiwan and China, running an Internet scam that tricked people into paying fake traffic fines. They were forced to relocate their operations to Malaysia after local authorities there got wind of their scam.

Police had acted on tip-offs from their counterparts in China and Taiwan, who said they believed thousands of people were taken in by the scam.

Last year Malaysian police dealt with 1,201 Internet scams involving more than 20 million ringgit (6.6 million dollars) -- a huge increase from 2009, which saw 333 cases worth 4.3 million ringgit.

KUALA LUMPUR, May 19, 2011 (Bernama) -- Police have crippled an international scam syndicate, which used social networking site Facebook to woo women, following the arrest of a Nigerian couple and a local woman.

Bukit Aman CID deputy director II Datuk Rodwan Mohd Yusof said today the suspects, aged between 26 and 39, were arrested on Monday in two separate raids in Seri Kembangan and Cheras.

Police started investigations after a 43-year-old Taiwanese businesswoman reported being conned of RM380,000 after falling in love with the Nigerian man on Facebook.

Rodwan told reporters at his office here that the man posed as a British national by the name of John Miller on the website where he started a relationship with the woman three months ago.

The suspect claimed to reside in the United Kingdom and told her that he would send a parcel containing items valued at Pound Sterling 950,000 for her to pick up in Malaysia.

"The woman lives in Taiwan. The suspect told her that she must pay a certain amount of money as the parcel was held in Malaysia," he said.

It was only after she did transactions amounting to RM380,000 that she realised that she had been duped in what had been dubbed the African Scam, Rodwan said.

He said the Taiwanese woman flew to Malaysia and filed a report at the Taiwan Embassy here which was passed on to the police.

In the Seri Kembangan raid, police seized RM100,000 worth of jewellery, USD15,000, RM14,260 and computer equipment, among other things, he said.

Police believe that money from the scam was used to operate a rental car business registered under the local woman's name.

Four vehicles including a Toyota Rush and Honda Accord, worth about RM400,000 were confiscated from the business premises located near the home of the couple in Seri Kembangan.

The couple have a 18-month-old son and the husband is residing in Malaysia using a tourist visa. The wife is a businesswoman.

He said the local woman, who was arrested at an apartment in Cheras, is a private college student.

Rodwan said the syndicate was believed to have begun operations about three or four months ago.

"We will investigate whether the syndicate was involved in other reported cases," he said.

He added that the suspects were remanded for four days until Friday.

Rodwan said that 759 fraud cases were reported last year involving estimated losses of RM20.5 million with 130 people convicted.

Up to last month, 245 cases were reported with RM9.4 million in losses and 48 people charged, he said.

KUALA LUMPUR (June 24, 2010): A 24-year-old Nigerian conman who was arrested by police for attempting to fleece a reporter from theSun through an email scam two weeks ago was let off the hook with a mere slap on the wrist and a free air ticket back to his country.

The suspect was caught in a sting operation with the journalist two weeks ago at the KL Convention Centre (KLCC) recreation park and handed over to Dang Wangi.

The suspect, who is registered as a student at a private college, was remanded for 14 days to be probed for attempting to cheat.

However, after the probe was completed and the investigation papers handed over to the Attorney-General of Chambers for further action on Tuesday, it was returned the following day stating that there was "inadequate evidence" to press charges on the suspect who went by the fake name Gerald Botata.

Dang Wangi police chief ACP Mohd Zulkarnain Ibrahim said the suspect has been handed over to the Immigration Department for deportation.

Sources said there have been cases of such deported suspects returning to Malaysia months later using passports from a different country.

The story and account of the scam and sting was was frontpaged in theSun a week ago.

Early this month, the reporter had received the scam email from a so-called United Nations military officer who claimed to have acquired more than US$16 million from several side deals he had made from oil rigs during his tour of duty in Iraq.

The reporter was promised a 30% cut from the sum if he agreed to "help" by storing the money for the scammer who identified himself as Capt Allan Smith.

Playing along with the scammer's ruse, the reporter alerted the police and agreed to play bait in the sting operation.

A week later, a man called Dr Philip Moore who claimed to be a Red Cross diplomat representing Smith, called the reporter and told him he was instructed to deliver a large parcel containing the millions in cash.

He demanded for RM25,000 for shipping and other charges and directed the reporter to Botata. When Botata and the reporter met on June 10 at the KLCC, the Nigerian was nabbed in the sting operation which involved about 15 detectives.

Foreign conmen, especially Nigerians and those from other African countries, who enter the country on the pretext of pursuing their studies have fleeced locals of millions of ringgit in such scams and through false romantic seductions.

In the latest case, four Nigerians were arrested for kidnapping their countryman who is a student at a local college here for ransom. However, police managed to track down the suspects.

Selangor acting CID chief ACP Omar Mammah said today police investigations revealed that many more may have fallen victim to the Nigerian kidnappers but had not lodge reports. He urged these victims to come forward and report their ordeal to the police. -- theSun