Commercial crime crackdown

> New unit targets scams, money-game investments

KUALA LUMPUR: A special unit has been set up to tackle the increasing number of commercial crime cases in the country, says Inspector-General of police Tan Sri Mohamad Fuzi Harun (pix).

“These crimes are at a worrying stage and tackling it would be the main priority of police this year,” Mohamad Fuzi said, adding Bukit Aman’s Commercial Crime Investigation Department is embarking on a nationwide crackdown on commercial crime to bring down the number of cases.

The unit will be headed by CCID (Cyber and Enforcement Investigation) principal assistant director SAC Ahmad Noordin Ismail

“Out of the 28,271 commercial crime CCID cases recorded last year, 6,417 were successfully charged in court or in other words, 24.4% cases were taken to court compared to 17.8% in 2016.

“It is a worrying trend. This year we have recorded 2,333 cases so far,” he told reporters after attending Bukit Aman’s monthly assembly here yesterday.

Mohamad Fuzi said attention has to be given to money-game investments, online scams and cyber crime.

He said Bukit Aman had conducted collaborative training with Singapore and Chinese police and is looking forward to having more training sessions with other regional and international countries too,” he added.

He said the CCID had initiated several operations in 2017 to tackle white-collar crimes:

Ops Tiong, an operation to clamp down on African scams resulted in 1,243 raids and 1,705 suspects nabbed.

Ops Pelican, an operation to tackle Macau scams resulted in 417 raids and 1,239 suspects nabbed.

Ops Vulture, to nab Ah Long syndicates resulted in 2,164 raids and 1,318 suspects nabbed.

Ops Nuri, to combat investment scams resulted in 157 raids and 169 suspects nabbed.

Among the other successes of the department included Ops Mortgage which resulted in the arrest of 13 people for cheating, with three charged on Jan 26 for their involvement in a bogus property loan application scheme in which seven financial institutions which have since incurred losses of more than RM10 million.

At the monthly assembly, several CCID personnel were recognised for the efforts in several operations.

Among them was SAC S. Sasikala Devi for her contributions in busting a syndicate under Ops Mortgage.