JOHOR BARU: They hung around banks, keeping an eye mostly on elderly folk and pretending to help them when these senior citizens fumbled at the ATM.These fake good Samaritans would offer to help them withdraw money from the machine.
Once the hapless senior citizens hand over their cards and PIN, they would discreetly switch the ATM card with a faulty one.
Their other method was to insert a strip of cloth into the ATM card slot, resulting in the card not being able to be inserted.
These crooks would then flee with the victim’s ATM card and quickly make withdrawals at other ATMs nearby, using the PIN that had been given to them.
“The money was withdrawn quickly before the victim could call the bank to stop the withdrawals,” a police officer said.
This gang had duped almost 10 people in Muar, Mersing and Kluang, and escaped with over RM100,000 since early this year.
However, their activities came to an end when a team of officers from the Commercial Crimes (CCID) and Criminal Investigation Department (CID) tracked down and arrested three of the suspects, including an Indonesian.
The men, in their 30s and 40s, were nabbed in a series of raids in Muar.
The official said most of the victims were retirees. Their ages ranged from 50s to 70s.
“One of them lost more than RM30,000 within a few days via withdrawals and transfers to other accounts,” the official said.
It is learnt that all of the gang members had prior criminal records and had been remanded to assist in investigations.
In a separate case, a 31-year-old housewife lost RM100,000 of her savings after being duped by an online investment scam.
Muar OCPD Asst Comm Raiz Mukhliz Azman Aziz said the former bank officer came across an advertisement on Facebook on March 14.
“She was interested in the scheme and made contact with an unknown person, who told her that she could earn up to 50% in profits within one month of making an investment,” he said in a statement yesterday.
ACP Raiz said the victim then met with a 30-year-old woman, who claimed to be a representative of the company, on April 30.
“The woman further explained about the supposed investment before the victim agreed to sign an online agreement.
“She then made nine financial transactions totalling RM100,000 to one bank account under a company’s name,” he added.
To date, she has yet to hear from the company, prompting her to lodge a police report on Monday.
