Petrol attendant ‘skimmed cards’

A number of bank card “disputed transactions” triggered a bank investigation that ended with the arrest of a petrol attendant at a filling station in Bellville, a court in Cape Town heard yesterday.

The court heard that the quick arrival of the police at Stellenberg Motors led to the arrest of petrol attendant Mzimasi Bizwapi, 42, allegedly in possession of an illegal bank card skimming device.

Bizwapi has pleaded not guilty to one charge of conspiracy to commit fraud, and six counts involving the violation of the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act.

He is on trial in the Bellville Specialised Commercial Crime Court, before magistrate Sabrina Sonnenberg.

At yesterday’s proceedings, police captain Trevor Bailey told the court how three alleged victims reported “disputed transactions” to their banks, started the investigation, and at the end of the probe there were 11 victims.

Questioned by defence attorney Carika Esterhuizen, he said all the bank cards had been issued by Standard Bank.

Bizwapi was arrested at the service station in December 2014.

The charge sheet revealed that the owner of Stellenberg Motors received complaints from customers. The garage proprietor notified Standard Bank’s fraud investigator, Pieter Jordaan, who soon uncovered a bank card fraud syndicate.

Prosecutor Jacques Smith alleges that the syndicate supplied Bizwapi with a skimming device, and that his role was to use the skimmer to capture the data on credit and debit cards, used by customers to pay for petrol.

In June 2014, the petrol station manager, Coreen Steyn, became suspicious of goings-on at the filling station, and alerted the police.

According to the charge sheet, a police official arrived soon afterwards and searched all the attendants on duty – and allegedly found a skimmer in Bizwapi’s trouser pocket.

The case continues on May 12. – ANA