Last year, a 52-year-old woman from the Waldshut district fell into the trap of a gang of fraudsters who took a six-figure sum from her under false promises.
In spring 2016 she received a friend request via Facebook, which led to contact with the fraudsters. The Facebook friend posed as a member of a UN peacekeeping mission in Syria and gained the woman's trust until he finally came forward with his concerns.
He said that during the operation in Syria they came across cash worth around five million US dollars. They now want to take this money out of the country in order to support the families of his comrades who died in the operation.
The victim was persuaded to accept the money. But there were ongoing “difficulties” with providing the money, and the gullible victim stepped into the financial breach so as not to let the project fail.
She advanced money for alleged registrations, fees and customs duties in Syria and transferred 10,000 euros to an account in Ghana.
A priest was then supposed to bring the box with the money from Syria to Ghana. In addition, bribes were faked for customs in Ghana. Another 70,000 euros were demanded here. The million-dollar treasure was then supposed to be taken over by a diplomat and transported to Germany via England.
But the “difficulties” didn’t go away:
The diplomat was stopped in London and urgently needed an amount of ten thousand euros in order to be able to continue his journey.
He was also held at customs in Frankfurt, and this time the fraudsters allegedly demanded a cash handover of 21,000 euros.
The victim was later given a small safe with a combination lock that was supposed to contain the million dollar amount. The numerical code that was given to the victim did not match and the safe could not be opened.
Now it came to the actual “wash-wash”:
One of the fraudsters, the alleged diplomat, appeared at the victim's residence, opened the small safe and took out some black papers the size of banknotes.
After dousing it with a chemical brought by the perpetrator, some 50 euro bills emerged, but the chemical was then used up.
The perpetrator and victim drove to Zurich to obtain a large amount of the “two-component chemical”, for which the victim had to pay several thousand euros.
Once the victim was on the hook after so many expenses, the demands got higher and higher: 40,000 euros for the conversion process, 120,000 euros for the expensive chemicals, but the woman still didn't get her expenses reimbursed. After relatives became aware of the large payments, they went to the police together and reported the matter.
In consultation with the criminal police, contact with the fraudsters was maintained.
A meeting was arranged with the alleged diplomat to hand over additional funds to purchase the expensive decolorizing chemical. When he appeared at the meeting in Waldshut in mid-December, he was arrested by the police. The public prosecutor's office has applied for an arrest warrant against the 41-year-old man from Liberia and he is currently in custody.
Source: Freiburg Police Headquarters
Notes:
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