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Criminals in the country have now adopted new tricks in defrauding innocent and unsuspecting Nigerians.They are now unbeatable in their games. They are so fast and tricky in their act and most times perfect.Emeka Ibemire writes on the new world of tricks designed by robbers and other sundry criminals to get at their prey.
Funke Adebola(not real name), sat comfortably on a cushion in her room, browsing her phone when an alert hit her phone as she was waiting for an alert from her husband who was to credit her account that Saturday morning of December 24, 2016.
As she rushed to open the message box in her phone, instead of bank alert, MTN credit card alert of N1, 500; was what she saw.
Bemused and confused, she guessed who might have sent the card, but few minutes later, a call came in from the other side and a voice supposedly from a man called her to tell her that the credit card was sent to her phone in an error and pleaded her to forward the credit card back to the phone number that sent it; she complied with ease. But few minutes after she responded, another call from the same man came in again, this time thanking her for her good gestures for not converting the credit to herself, but showed she was a good Christian. The man however demanded her bank details to enable him show appreciation in cash for being a ‘good Nigerian’, The man went further to eulogise her saying she was a rare Nigerian. The man also demanded her house address, BVN, and other personal information. But because Funke wasn’t keen in the man’s request, she ended the topic without responding to him.
It was gathered that Funke would have been a victim of robbery incident if she had supplied her bank details and home address to the criminal calling to appreciate her.
If Funke was wise and lucky to have beaten the criminal to his game, it wasn’t so for 38 years old Gladys Hassan. Hassan went to one of the new generation banks with huge amount of money belonging to her company to deposit in the bank. Inside the bank was a lady who dressed in working class attire and posed inside the bank as one of the staffers on duty. As she spotted Gladys, she rushed her and directed her to the bulk room of the bank, as the place she would deposit her money.
The ‘mysterious lady’ in question requested Gladys to go to the counter to get deposit slip, and Gladys moved to get the slip while trusting the money in the mysterious lady’s hand but by the time she returns to the bulk room of the bank, the mysterious lady had vanished into thin-air. Gladys cried and wept uncontrollable but the lady was nowhere to be found .
The bank manager was helpless and through the CCTV mounted in the bank, they discovered that the lady wasn’t a staff of the bank and search for her began. These are few new tricks criminals have adopted to defraud and rob their unsuspecting victims who fall prey to these antics.
Before now, the generator trick had been on and is still in use by some criminals. A victim of a generator trick recounting his ordeal narrated how he would have been a victim if he had come out to check his generator that went off in the dead hour of the night. It was gathered that robbers would put off ones generator and wait for the person to come out to check the cause and in the process would be forced to open his door and lead the robbers to his room.
“I always imagined the generator trick in my mind but I never imagined it was a practice already,” he stated. “One Sunday morning I asked my brother to go and put fuel in the generator because I woke up to see the generator off, even though I put eight litres of fuel at 1am only to wake up at 7am to see that the generator was off. I just assumed the fuel finished but when my brother got to the generator, there was fuel in it.” The victim added.
“It means someone had powered off my generator because they noticed I always come out at night to refuel.”
Last year, due to numerous tricks recently adopted by criminals to rob their victims, the Lagos State Police Command issued a warning to residents alerting them on the new schemes of criminals in the state, particularly at night, before carrying out their criminal acts.
SP Dolapo Badmos, spokesperson for the command said criminals now engage in switching off running power generating sets or turn on tap water to lure unsuspecting residents out in an attempt to rob or kidnap them. The spokesperson however, advised residents to be vigilant and not come out at night, if they notice tap running within their compounds or when their generators suddenly stopped working. “Residents should be careful when they discover that their generators stop working or notice water gushing out from their taps, at night. Lagos warns residents of new tricks by criminals.
Also, Lagos State government in a statement signed by the Chief Press Secretary to the Governor, Habib Aruna, said criminal minded persons have new trick of volunteering their white handkerchief to people in the same bus with them in the cause of trying to assist them to wipe their sweat while in a vehicle. He stated that the motive was to render their victims unconscious through rubbing a perfumed handkerchief on their face and immediately one uses such material, he will be unconscious. The statement alerted that the bandits usually target unsuspecting victims either in a lonely commuter bus, taxi or a quiet corner. It added that by the time the effect of the drugged perfume wears off, the criminals would have fled with valuables dispossessed off their victim.
“It is not yet known how harmful the drug being used on the handkerchief is. While that is being checked out, it may be necessary to alert members of the public on this new dimension,” the statement read in parts. Dolapo advised residents to know the telephone numbers of the Divisional Police Officers (DPOs) or station phone numbers close to them.
