A 29-year-old suspect has been arrested by the Hawks’ Serious Corruption Investigation unit in Bloemfontein on charges of fraud and money laundering. The arrest follows an extensive probe into a scam in which approximately R85,800 was defrauded from a victim in December 2022.
According to authorities, the complainant was allegedly contacted via email by an individual posing as a representative of the United States government. The suspect promised the victim a COVID-19-related grant on the condition that she deposit money into a specified bank account.
To bolster credibility, the suspect provided a list of purported beneficiaries who had allegedly qualified for the same grant. The complainant recognized a friend’s name on the list and reached out to her via Facebook for confirmation. The friend appeared to verify receiving the payout, prompting the victim to proceed with the transaction.
However, it was later revealed that the complainant had been communicating with a fraudster who had hacked her friend’s Facebook account to legitimize the scam.
