LAND OWNED BY FOREIGNERS
surveyed the plots of land.
They even pretended to be the landowners to convince one of their victims.
State Commercial Crime Investigation Department chief Assistant Commissioner Mohd Salleh Abdullah said the suspects told their victims that they were land brokers, who were tasked with selling three plots of land owned by a Singaporean and another plot owned by an Indonesian.
He said initial investigation revealed that they raked in about RM15 million from those dubious land deals.
“Suspects started their illegal activity in 2011.
“So far, police have identified four plots of land, which had been illegally sold.
“Three of them are located here and one in Gelang Patah,” he told the NST.
Salleh said the trio targeted land owned by foreigners because they seldom checked on their land.
“These plots remained vacant for many years.”
Police had arrested two men, aged 38 and 50, in Kuala Lumpur on March 3, and detained a 43year-old former Johor Land and Mines Office administrative assistant here on March 6 in connection with the illegal land sales in Johor.
The trio were reportedly part of a syndicate.
The syndicate identified foreign-owned land in the state and used their strong ties with the Johor Land and Mines Office to forge land titles to convince their victims.
Meanwhile, in a separate matter, state executive councillor Datuk Abd Latif Bandi’s application for a review of his weeklong remand order in connection with a Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission investigation was rejected by the High Court here.
Judge Datuk Mohd Sofian Abd Razak upheld the remand period that was previously granted by the magistrate’s court, saying that there was no merit for a review of the period of detention since the lower court had used its discretion when it granted the remand period.
Latif’s remand will end tomorrow. He was represented by counsels Abd Rahim Ali, Ibrahim Haikal Razak, Adzly Manas and Mohd Fairuz Mahmood.