Offering Pension Investment Accidentally Met Scammers, Elderly Waited 6 Years for Justice

Investing incorrectly in a fraudulent group's bond investment plan, the victims have been waiting almost 6 years, still unable to see justice. 

According to the Malaysian International Humanitarian Organization (MHO), the fraudulent group has swindled 87 people out of 47 million MYR, but they believe that many others have not complained to them or reported it to the police, so the losses might reach hundreds of millions of MYR.

Even more infuriating is that many of the victims are elderly, who handed over their hard-earned pensions to the scammers. One of the victims, Mohamad from Kuala Lumpur, said during an interview that he was scammed out of 500,000 MYR.

Datuk Hishammuddin, the MHO's secretary-general, pointed out that this case had previously been brought to court in Penang, but the case was ultimately decided as discharge not amounting to an acquittal (DNAA) because the initial victims withdrew their case.

He indicated that this situation caused similar cases nationwide to be classified as a reference to the above report (ROR), which led to many cases remaining unresolved.

The Malaysian International Humanitarian Organization has also reported this case to the Securities Commission and the national bank. They ultimately returned to the Bukit Aman Commercial Crime Investigation Department, requesting that they re-coordinate similar fraud cases nationwide, not to refer to the above court case.

“It is comforting to know that of the 87 cases we have received, the police have started files on 22 cases and are investigating them under relevant sections of the criminal code.”

Nearly 20 victims also gathered outside the Commercial Crime Investigation Department on Monday (21st), expressing during an interview that they invested in the related bond investment plan as early as 2017. Initially, there were returns for several months, but after 2019, there was no news.

“The reason we believed in them (the scammers) was because they prepared buy-and-sell contracts, which didn't seem like a scam, and the return rates were high.”

As a result, unsuspecting victims, especially the elderly, even in their later years, have to frequently visit the police station to understand the progress of their cases.