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BUKIT MERTAJAM – Police busted four unlicensed money-lending syndicates offering loans with high interest rates after detaining 29 individuals, including a woman, in a series of 12 raids in Penang and Perak on Thursday.
Bukit Aman Commercial Crime Investigation Department director Datuk Zainuddin Yaacob said that acting on information and intelligence, the Bukit Aman and Penang departments raided 12 locations in Seberang Prai Tengah and Seberang Prai Utara in Penang and in Kerian, Perak from 6am to 10am before detaining the 29 people, aged 21 to 54.
“Police managed to bust four Ah Long syndicates -- Ahboy, Anson, Alvin, and Ahhow – which offered illegal loans via online to borrowers such as traders, government employees, and those in the private sector nationwide.
“Their modus operandi is to advertise money-lending offers on social media apps such as Facebook, WeChat and WhatsApp, with the loan interest rate being 10% to 15% for a period of one week,” he told a press conference here today.
He said they would then threaten borrowers who failed to pay their debts by turning up at the borrowers’ homes or workplaces, as well as committing acts of violence on the borrowers’ property.
Zainuddin said apart from that, the syndicates would also contact borrowers who failed to repay their loans and offer them new loans to settle previous debts, so that the victims would continue to be indebted to the lenders and would have to make multiple payments.
He said initial investigations found that the four syndicates had been carrying out such activities since 2017 and offered loans ranging from RM1,000 to millions of ringgit involving thousands of borrowers nationwide.
Seized in the raids were 119 cheques from various banks, 68 mobile phones, 27 bank cards, various loan documents, jewellery, 10 vehicles, and cash amounting to RM98,718, as well as a machete believed to be used to threaten borrowers.
He said that from the beginning of this year until yesterday, his team had investigated 291 cases related to such activities involving loans amounting to RM1.5 million. – Bernama, April 10, 2021
