Gang forged bank, salary statements used for loan fraud

Police have arrested two men and two women for the forgery of bank and salary statements used to defraud loan companies of about 20 million baht.

Pol Lt Gen Jirabhop Bhuridej, commissioner of the Central Investigation Bureau, said on Friday that Satawat Chaengchawee, 27, and Wanwisa Pramjon, 30, were arrested at their home in Sri Racha district of Chon Buri and Polawat Srithong, 34, and Ratanaporn Lawan, 32, were apprehended in Kanchanaburi,  on Thursday.

They were charged with fraud, supplying false and damaging information to computer systems and document forgery.

Pol Lt Gen Jirabhop said Mr Satawat and his wife Wanwisa opened websites and offered to provide bank statements and salary confirmation letters people could use to apply for loans from financial institutions and to get visas from embassies to work or study abroad.

Police seized from them two computers, two tablet computers, 16 bank accounts books and a motorcycle they used when withdrawing money from ATMs.

Mr Polawat and Ms Ratanaporn opened the bank accounts, in their own names, that the other couple used.

According to Pol Lt Gen Jirabhop, Mr Satawat admitted to using websites and LINE chat accounts to conduct illicit business. He charged each client 6,000-50,000 baht, depending on ordered amounts of money and transactions listed on the fake statements.

He had previously been arrested for similar offences and sentenced to five years and four months in jail. He was free on bail pending an appeal when he repeated the crime, the commissioner said.

"Over the past year, more than 1,000 people hired this group to prepare false statements. It had financial transactions worth about 20 million baht. The financial institutions that lent to the people lost about 20 million baht,"  Pol Lt Gen Jirabhop said.