MIRI: Two women here were conned by different scam syndicates and lost a total of RM8,000.
District police chief ACP Hakemal Hawari said the first case involved a trader in her late 30s, who was responded to a money lending advertisement on Sept 18.
She later received a call from an alleged agent from the company and a representative from a bank, who informed the victim that if she refused to proceed with the loan, her name would be blacklisted for five years.
Worried about this, the victim decided to pursue the application and provided a photo of her identity card, bank statement and a photo of her signature to the suspect via WhatsApp.
“The victim was also told to put in a sum of money for the process of approving her loan worth RM50,000.
“After the victim’s loan was said to have been approved, the suspect asked her to deposit another amount of money for various reasons for the process of depositing the money into her bank account.
“The victim did as she was told and transferred more than RM3,000 to a bank account provided by the suspect,” ACP Hakemal said, adding that the victim became suspicious and lodged a police report.
He added that the second case involved a civil servant in her late 40s, who lost RM5,000 to Macau scam syndicate disguised as an Inland Revenue Board (IRB) Cyberjaya branch officer.
On Sept 10, the victim received a call from the suspect claiming that she had tax arrears amounting to RM32,057 from a company in Terengganu.
The victim was given two options, either to be detained for 45 days at the Terengganu police headquarters to assist in investigation or to transfer all her savings into the account of the National Audit Department.
“Fearing detention, the victim chose to transfer her savings amounting to RM5,000 to an account provided by the suspect.
“However, the victim realised that she had been deceived after checking at Miri IRB and was told that there were no arrears under her name.”
Both cases are being investigated under Section 420 of the Penal Code for cheating, which carries a maximum jail term of 10 years, whipping and fine, if convicted.
