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Police arrest four over property scam in Jakarta
The suspects are accused of duplicating house ownership certificates and returning fake ones to the home owners, while using the originals as guarantees at banks to borrow billions of rupiah.
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Four suspects have been arrested in connection with a property scam and are accused of duplicating house ownership certificates, returning the fake ones to the rightful owners, while using the originals as guarantees to borrow billions of rupiah from banks. (Shutterstock/File)
J
akarta Police have arrested four suspects in connection with a property scam in Jakarta that resulted in billions of rupiah in losses for the victims.
“From the three victims, the suspects [allegedly] got money of up to Rp 214 billion [US$15.07 million]. They started their [alleged] crimes in March this year,” Jakarta Police spokesperson Sr. Comr. Argo Yuwono said on Monday, wartakota.tribunnews.com reported.
He claimed the suspects, identified as D, R, S and A, used the money to buy a car and a motorcycle, among other things.
Police have confiscated the vehicles, Rp 28 million, 2,000 Singaporean dollars, luxury watches, rings and documents suspected to have been used in the commission of the crime.
Argo explained that the suspects were arrested at their office in Tebet Timur, South Jakarta last week.
The office was purported to be that of a property agent and public notary.
Argo accused the suspects of targeting victims who owned luxury houses and wanted to sell for more than Rp 15 billion.
He alleged the suspects would pretend to be property agents and notaries who requested the house ownership certificates for duplication.
The men are accused of returning the fake certificates to the victims while using the originals as guarantees to borrow billions of rupiah from banks.
The scam was discovered when one of the victims reported the case to the police after receiving information from a bank that money had been borrowed using the victim's house as a guarantee.
Police are investigating the case, including the possibility that there may be one additional suspect, Argo said. (sau/iwa)
