KOTA BHARU:A male civil servant in his 40s lost almost RM70,000 after being deceived by a Macau Scam syndicate member who posed as a police officer with the title ‘Datuk’, claiming that he was involved in drug dealing and money laundering.

Kelantan police chief Datuk Shafien Mamat said the report of the incident was lodged on Feb 3, when the victim realised that he had been duped after finding the money in his bank account missing.

He said, based on the report, the incident occurred at the end of last year when the victim received a phone call from a woman who told him that he had tax arrears amounting to RM38,600 involving a company owned by the victim in Kuantan, Pahang, which he denied.

“The phone call was then transferred to a ‘policeman’ who introduced himself as 'Sergeant Ridzuan' who told the victim that he had a case record related to drug smuggling and money laundering,” he said in a statement, today.

Shafien said the phone call was later transferred to two other ‘senior police officers' who introduced themselves as ‘Inspector Fariezan’ and ‘ACP Dato' Wazir’ respectively, who ordered the victim to prepare money to solve the case.

“The victim then followed all the instructions given by the suspects, among others, downloading fake MyBNM application as well as to fill in the details of his bank accounts including TAC number received, allegedly for investigation purposes.

“However, on Jan 31, the victim, when checking his bank accounts, found that almost RM70,000 had been transferred without his knowledge to bank accounts belonging to third parties,” he said.

Realising that he had been deceived, the victim lodged a police report to the Commercial Crime Investigation Division of the Kota Bharu district police headquarters.

Meanwhile, Shafien said since the beginning of January until yesterday, the state Commercial Crime Investigation Department has received and conducted investigations into 15 police reports linked to Macau Scam, involving losses of more than RM300,000.

-- BERNAMA