Schoolteacher accused of fraud, claims she too was a Facebook scam victim

By T. Farook Thajudeen 

A woman arrested by the Financial Crimes Branch of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) and remanded over allegations of defrauding people of several hundred thousand rupees through threats and deceit, told the Colombo Chief Magistrate that she herself had fallen victim to an online scam while working as a Facebook-based worker. 

During the inquiry before Colombo Chief Magistrate Asanka S. Boderagama, the suspect said she was not involved in any fraudulent or deceitful activity. She claimed that she had been drawn into a fake Facebook employment scheme after responding to a message on the social media platform. 

According to her statement, the message promised a large daily payment in return for services she was expected to provide to the advertiser. Consequently, she was asked to provide her bank account number to the advertiser. 

Thereafter, the advertiser had instructed her that she would receive funds to her account and to transfer it to some other accounts which the advertiser 

would give her. 

The suspect had acted accordingly to the advice of the advertiser, and she was arrested by the CID on charges of forgery and cheating people. The suspect said that she is innocent and that she was used by the real culprits to commit the offence. 

The prosecuting CID officer told the Magistrate that they had come upon similar cases in the past, too, and there are organised gangs who operate through Facebook and YouTube to deceive unsuspecting Facebook users by making use of innocent people as a cat’s paw. 

Magistrate Asanka S. Boderagama ordered the CID to conduct an investigation to bring the mastermind to book, and further investigations were postponed 

for June 5. 

Attorneys at Law Mohamed Afler, Mohamed Libras and Udul Premaratna appeared for the suspect.