Mushroom farming scammers make off with 1.29bn baht

POLICE held an urgent meeting today (Aug.1) to solve a mushroom farming fraud case in which 1,867 victims have lost altogether 1.29 billion baht in the well-promoted scam, TV Channel 7 said.

Deputy national police chief Pol. Gen. Damrongsak KittiPraphat, as head of the Police Cyber Taskforce, told all units to accelerate investigation into this big swindle and coordinate with the Anti-Money Laundering Office in tracking the money ripped off from the victims and returning it to them.

However, investigation revealed that the suspects left the country on November 30, 2021 but arrest warrants for them will soon be issued with coordination with Interpol to bring them back for legal action as soon as possible.

Pol. Gen. Damrongsak revealed that victims had filed complaints against a company in Sakon Nakhon province that tricked them into investing in their mushroom farms. They were told that by investing in these mushroom farms they would become like the owners but would not have to actually do any work while getting 18-30% dividend a month.

The victims added that they were taken in because this scheme was introduced by well-known celebrities.

While they initially got the promised dividend, later this company stopped paying them and told them that the banks had frozen their accounts. This led to a large number of people filing complaints at Sakon Nakhon police station and elsewhere in the country.

National Police Chief Pol. Gen. Suwat Chaengyodsuk ordered all police units to facilitate the victims of this fraud because there are so many of them and spread out across the country. The Cyber Crime Investigation Bureau was told to handle this case but if the team cannot themselves question some of the victims questionnaires are to be sent to the local police to do so for them.

The victims who have not yet filed a complaint were told to do so at the Cyber Crime Investigation Bureau or local police station.

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Representative images of mushrooms. Photos: Sanook.com

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