Woman duped of RM60,000 in kidnapping hoax

IPOH: A 55-year-old mother hopes to recover the ransom she paid for the release of her 32-year-old son in September, after learning that the kidnapping case was a hoax.
On Sept 19, Yau Sau Har from Pekan Razaki received a call from a Mr Wong who demanded RM60,000 for the release of her son Lai Yin Hoe, 32.
"I could hear my son's voice in the background asking to be released," she said at a press conference arranged by the Perak Barisan Nasional Public Services and Complaints bureau here today.
Yau told the man she had only had RM35,159 and he instructed her to deposit the money into a bank account under the name of a Mr Koh.
Her son, however was not kidnapped but at work. The "kidnappers" had kept his phone busy to prevent his mother from contacting him.
She realised she was duped when she finally managed to reach Lai, a crane operator after depositing the money.
I immediately alerted the bank which froze the account of Mr Koh," she said.
Yau and Lai each lodged a police report.
The mother learnt that RM10,000 had already been withdrawn.
The public should be wary of such scam and seek the assistance of the bureau if they come across such cases, said bureau head Mohd Rawi Abdullah.
He said the tricksters chose to carry out their ruse on Friday afternoons so that the intended victims would not have enough time to alert the banks.
He added the bureau will write to Bank Negara and Bukit Aman commercial crime division to speed up the investigation.