The investigators have unearthed the involvement of an inspector-level officer of the DMP’s Gulshan Division in the recent ATM forgery.
During primary investigation, two police officers were found involved with the gang that had collected information of more than 4,000 debit and credit card users in the last one year.
Later the inspector was transferred to a police station in Rangpur range while investigation against the other officer is underway, a senior official of the Detective Branch of police told the Dhaka Tribune last night, seeking anonymity.
“After we get detail information about the inspector’s involvement with the gang, he can be shown arrested in the cases filed over the scam,” the DB officer added.
The law enforcers have so far arrested four persons – a foreigner and three officers of City Bank. They are Piotr Szczepan Mazurek alias Thomas Peter, and Maksud, Rezaul Karim Shahin and Refaz Ahmed Roni.
Peter’s Bangladeshi wife Merina was also interrogated by the police, but she claimed that she had no idea about the scam.
Peter holds a German national identity card but came to Bangladesh with a Polish passport, police said.
Police claimed that a UK-based Bangladeshi expatriate, Farid Nabir, had masterminded and coordinated the forgery. Farid, however, rejected the allegation and claimed that he had assisted the police with information on Peter’s whereabouts.
On the other hand, the investigators have finalised a list of around 45 people for their involvement in the forgery and instructed the Immigration Department to bar them from leaving the country.
Md Shahjahan, additional deputy commissioner of DB police, said that legal action would be taken against the suspects after analysing the information given by the arrestees during interrogation.
The suspects include 17 officers of four private banks, 11 businessmen, seven hotel owners and four foreigners – all members of the same gang.
The investigators said that the gang had robbed several crore taka from the account holders using clone cards from ATMs and POS machines at shops and residential hotels. The criminals had installed skimming devices in the ATM machines to copy the card information.
Earlier police said that at least 40 clients of three banks had lost around Tk20 lakh from their debit and credit cards on February 7-8. Later Eastern Bank compensated 24 clients.
The DB official said that the two foreigners – Ukrainian Andy and Romanian Romeo, both associates of Peter – had left the country in mid February with no less than $27,000 with them.
It was also learnt that a single bank had lost around Tk3.4 crore in Point of Sale (POS) terminal forgery last year.
The number of accused and the amount lost from the cards could go up remarkably after the end of the investigation, the anonymous DB source said.
On the other hand, a laptop and a mobile phone recovered from Peter’s house were sent to the forensic laboratory of the Criminal Investigation Department. More names and details of the plan could be learnt once those are analysed by the CID officials.
Bangladesh Bank said that the forgers had collected information of around 1,200 cards.
Tanvir Hassan Zoha, working as technical analyst of the Police Bureau of Investigation, told the Dhaka Tribune that the figure would not be less than 3,000.
Monirul Islam, additional commissioner of the DMP, said that the way the gang had collected the money, it is impossible to complete the investigation without the help of the bank officials.
“We have got some crucial information from the arrestees and we are analysing those. Necessary action will be taken against those responsible after an in-depth investigation,” said Monirul, also the chief of Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime unit.
DMP Commissioner Asaduzzaman Mia at a programme yesterday said that there should be a separate law so that the law enforcement agencies could work jointly with the banks and other stakeholders in such cases.