[ 2012-07-04 ]

Ghana Police arrest '419' kingpin
An expatriate alleged to be the mastermind behind
a number of business frauds and 419 cases has been
arrested by the Criminal Investigations Department
(CID) of the Ghana Police Service.

The suspect, Sohiel Issah Arbid, 59, a
Palestinian-born American, was arrested when he
and his Ghanaian accomplices, who are currently at
large, allegedly defrauded a Japanese consultant
of $120,000 under the pretext of selling gold to
him.

The suspect and his accomplices lured the
Japanese, Kaya Yusuke, 36, from South Africa to
Ghana to fleece him of his money.

According to the Director in charge of the Vetting
and Crime Analysis Unit of the CID, Chief
Superintendent Dennis Abade, the suspect had been
on the police wanted list for quite some time
now.

He said to carry out the business fraud, the
suspect met his victims at hotels to verify
samples of products they had been asked to buy.

After that, he informed the victims that he had
just flown into the country from abroad to
purchase the products.

Chief Supt Abade said his presence alone was
enough for people to part with huge sums of money,
only for them to realise later that they had been
duped.

He said almost all the units investigating fraud
cases, such as Visa Fraud and Commercial Crime,
had cases involving the suspect.

Following Arbid’s arrest, a number of victims went
to the CID Headquarters to identify him as the
person alleged to be at the centre of a number of
business fraud and 419 cases.

Chief Supt Abade said on June 25, 2012, Yusuke was
lured into the country by Arbid and his Ghanaian
accomplices through another Japanese businessman.

On arrival in the country, Yusuke met the said
Japanese, who introduced Arbid as a businessman
who could supply any quantity of gold.

He said unknown to Yusuke, his Japanese friend had
also been lured by the suspect and his accomplices
into the country, for the same purpose of duping
him.

The director said Arbid told the complainant that
he knew some Ghanaian gold dealers who could
supply any quantity of gold at a cheap price and
the victim decided to buy three kilogrammes of
gold at a cost of $120,000.

He said on June 28, 2012, the suspect introduced
two Ghanaians to Yusuke as the suppliers of the
gold and the three presented three bars of gold
which they claimed weighed three kilogrammes.

But Yusuke insisted that he wanted the transaction
to pass through the Precious Minerals Marketing
Company (PMMC) Limited and Arbid agreed.

Arbid took Yusuke to the PMMC, where another
accomplice, posing as an official of the PMMC,
took the gold bars into one of the offices of the
company and returned shortly to confirm that the
three bars had tested positive for real gold.

Convinced that he had done the right thing, Yusuke
then paid $120,000 to the two men, who in turn
handed over the gold bars to him.

When Yusuke requested for the assayer’s report,
the suspects directed him to go personally to the
PMMC for it.

Chief Supt Abade said Yusuke went back to the
offices of the PMMC to get the necessary
documentation to have the gold exported to South
Africa but it was there that he detected that the
three bars were fake gold.

After realising that he had been duped, Yusuke
made a report to the police, who traced the
suspect to one of the plush hotels where he was
arrested.

He said unknown to Yusuke, his Japanese friend had
already been duped and wanted to return home but
had no money to buy a ticket, and so he was made
to lure another victim as a condition to get him a
ticket back home.

According to Chief Supt Abade, while Arbid was
being led away to the cells, a number of victims
identified him.

Source - Daily Graphic

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