- Millions withdrawn from ATM machines in a day
The short message ringtone woke up the couple already entangled in each other’s arms in a deep sleep. The wife, who knows her husband’s ring tone, hissed aloud imagining the woman that would send a text to her husband at that time of the night.
Also surprised and ready to beg for forgiveness, Ethel picked his phone. As soon as he saw the content, he jerked up from the bed shouting Ole! Ole! (Meaning: Thief! Thief!)
The content of the message was an alert from his bank that N133,420 was just debited from his account. It came in the form below:
Continue after the cut....
Alert Z
Acct: 101**877
*HERNDON
DT: 3/20/2014
MC Int ATM
Wdl-032000009148—
*HERND
DR Amt: 133,420
Br: Trinity 2
BAL: 1,142,475.50
REF: 291746746
Confused and sweating profusely under the cold weather of the night, he rushed and picked his wallets, and brought out his ATM card, just to be sure that no one close to him was playing a fast one on him. The couple’s fears got worsened as they kept receiving more alerts till his initial balance of N1.2 million was reduced to N10, 987.45. The next day, Ethel rushed to the bank and informed them of the fraudulent withdrawal from his account.
As at the time of filing this report, the bank has only promised to investigate the matter.
Saturday Sun’s investigation shows that Nnadi’s experience is one out of so many unexplained withdrawals from customers’ accounts either at the weekend or late at night, a development ravaging some of the banks at the moment.
The revelation from the Special Fraud Unit of the Police Force on this trend is as stunning as the shocking details that follow.
According to Zubairu Muazu, a Deputy Commissioner of police attached to SFU, Ikoyi, Lagos “the banks should be more vigilant and should also tighten their external and internal control. The rate of fraud in banks is really alarming, that you wonder if background checks are done before an individual is employed. Most of them are there strictly to defraud the bank.”
That gives a clue on the new trend in the banking sector where bank officials connive with outsiders to open fictitious accounts into which millions are surreptitiously moved from buoyant depositors accounts and same withdrawn from Automated Teller Machines, ATMs simultaneously far and above the limit allowed through such transaction.
Saturday Sun gathered that through the new trend, a whooping sum of N1.3 billion have been stolen in past months from two new generation banks (names withheld) through about 250 accounts opened for fictitious customers for the sake of the crime. Already, no fewer than 24 persons out of which 20 of them are bank officials have been nabbed in connection to this development.
Investigation reveals that the syndicate which is coordinated by bank officials would open series of accounts and divert money from the bank’s account to the various fictitious accounts across the country.
The huge funds transferred, an operation which is usually perfected during
weekends, would then be swiftly withdrawn through the ATM machines in a day.
Before the transfer, the syndicate would have used the profile of one of the staff of the bank attached to Card Services Unit at the head office to illegally modify the cash withdrawal limit of N150,000 per day on the fictitious accounts thus enabling the funded accounts to be dissipated through various machines across the country.
Top on the list was the stunning discovery of the diversion of N882 million from one of the bank’s accounts at its Kaduna Refinery branch, Kaduna to 100 different accounts across the country. “They had successfully withdrawn N100 million when the fraud was detected and the various accounts were frozen. They moved the money from a personal account in the bank on a Saturday and distributed it to a total of 100 different accounts opened in the bank and other banks.
“Luckily, the ICT man on duty noticed the outrageous movements of money but before he could stop the transaction or trace the source, slightly above N100 million has been withdrawn through ATM machines across the country. The balance has since been recovered and the suspects”, a police source involved in the investigation told Saturday Sun.
One Kayode Ojo Rotimi with account number: 0018921448 is said to be one of the beneficiaries of the fraud. He was subsequently arrested while trying to withdraw N7 million from the account. In this particular case, a total of 17 suspects have been arrested out of which 12 of them are bank staff.
Some of the suspects include Awodola Tunde, Aina Babatunde, Joshua Ayorinde, Fabusoro Simeon, Ojo Kayode, Samson Oluwafemi, Aladeniyi Ishola David, Folusho Onifade, Adindu Precious, Briska Joel, Musa Mohammed, Adekunle Sunday, Ishaya Bulus, Opeyemi Paseda, Onime Bright, Iparo Olubode, and Ogu John Augustine.
In the last quarter of last year, it was also discovered in another bank that on a particular day between 7.30pm and 8.30pm, an unusual fraudulent transfer totaling the sum of N251million was made into 18 various accounts by the syndicate using the profile of one Tolu Olagidi and Oluwaseun Tunji Adewole both staff of the bank at University of Ilorin Cash Center of the bank. Before anything could be done to verify the huge transfer, a total of N245, 200 million had been drawn from the account leaving a balance of only N5.8 million.
As usual, the withdrawals from the account were made with the use of several Automated Teller Machines (ATM) cash withdrawals, Point of Sales (POS) purchases and interbank transfers.
In this instance, it was further gathered that the ATM cash withdrawal parameter which limits daily cash withdrawals to N150,000 was altered at the bank’s Card Services Unit using the profile of one Usiade Nwazum Ebere attached to the unit.
Also in another branch of the bank in Ilorin, members of the syndicate were said to have gained access into one of their customers’ accounts and transferred the sum of N300 million into a certain SROC Partners Services account.
The lid was however uncovered when the relationship officer of the subject account realized that the account which has suddenly received an in-flow of N300 million has been dormant for some time.
Police investigations was said to have later revealed one Mustapha Adam, an ICT
staff of the bank as the mastermind through the footage of the CCTV camera at
the scene which exposed how he was allegedly manipulating the computer system to effect the transfer.
Detectives were subsequently despatched to Ebonyi, Enugu, Bayelsa, Rivers, FCT and Kano state where some of the intending beneficiaries were arrested.
In a similar move, another suspect Okonkwo Nwachukwu was last month arrested by detectives attached to the SFU when they discovered that he opened 25 accounts with different names, addresses but the same photograph. Initially he claimed that the accounts were opened to enable him withdraw as much money as he wants without limit for his business.
Nwachukwu was said to have gone to the Amuwo Odofin branch of the bank in Lagos to open a savings account and presented an already completed savings account opening package with the name Obiozor Ifeanyi and identified himself as such with a National Identity Card.
While the Customer Service officer was checking the documents, the suspect went to the Marketing Unit and collected another savings account opening package and completed same with another name Ogueji Nnamdi and returned to the Customer Service Desk and presented same for account opening with another National Identity Card bearing Ogueji Nnamdi.
Wondering why the same person would be attempting to open an account with different names, the Customer Service Officer decided to search the system with the phone number 08162502677 supplied by the customer and discovered that the same person had already opened about twenty-five (25) savings accounts at various branches bearing different names. Investigation further revealed that the suspect owns yet another 14 accounts in another new generation bank.
Confirming the development in an interview with Saturday Sun, the Deputy
Commissioner of Police in charge of SFU office in Lagos Zubairu Muazu stated that in recent times the unit has been able to recover millions from the fraudsters who are mostly bankers. “There is conspiracy between the customer and some smart persons in the bank. It involves different partners in the bank;
the person who initiates the transfer is different from the person who is in
ICT who will lift the caveat on the withdrawal limit”, he added.
On the way out of the ugly development, Muazu advised banks to take the issue of Know Your Customer, KYC serious. “The rules are very clear about the KYC that CBN imposed on them, it is very important. The banker should not see his job as routine thing; they should learn to be at alert always. I guess it is high time the banks introduce the use of biometrics for every customer, this could help reduce multiple entries”, he stressed.
-TheSun
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