KUCHING, Sept 28: The public is advised not to fall prey to unknown investment schemes that claim to be able to generate “too good to be true” returns.
State Commercial Crime and Investigation Department (CCID) chief Supt Mustafa Kamal Gani Abdullah said that so far this year, state police had recorded 79 cases involving RM12 million.
This is an increase of 132 per cent or 45 cases when compared to last year’s, he added.
“Recently, we have opened investigation papers for three cases. We have identified the suspects. Only waiting for time to refer the investigation papers to the prosecutor for them to charge,” Kamal told reporters today.
On another issue, Kamal also warned the public not to fall for the Macau or phone scams. He said if one does not know anything about the phone call or the subject of the call, just ignore it or hang up.
However, criminals have been getting more elaborate in their scams and could even duplicate numbers of enforcement agencies or other agencies to fool victims, he cautioned.
“Report to the police immediately if you receive such calls or talk to some friends about it. Do not try to handle it alone,” advised Kamal.
Up to yesterday, he said police recorded nine cases of Macau or phone fraud, where two victims were from Kuching, two from Padawan, three Sibu, one Miri and one Marudi.
Kamal said 30 individuals had been apprehended for being involved in Macau or phone scams this year involving loss amounting to RM7.8 million.
Another criminal act that Kamal highlighted were love scams or African scams, where victims, mostly women, fell for sweet-talking social media users.
“Last year, we recorded 95 love scams or African scams cases. This year, up to now, showed drop of 18 cases. Ninety per cent of the victims were females, and some were already married,” he said. — DayakDaily
