Police in hot pursuit of confidence tricksters

Asela Kuruluwansa

Confidence tricksters utilising their knowledge and intelligence have cheated people to the tune of Rs. 300 million worth of property and money during the past one and half years in the Central Province, Senior DIG of the Central Province Gamini Navaratne said.

“We have set up six public help services round the clock in the Central Province to gather information on these confidence tricksters,” the DIG said.

“These con men have bought vehicles from finance companies by submitting land deeds as securities. When they defaulted payments these deeds were checked to ascertain the bona fides of the documents. Most of these deeds were then found to be forged ones,” he said.

They have cheated several finance companies by submitting forged documents.

These fraudulent transactions have no connection with any bank. That has helped them carry out this kind of deal successfully, he said. “We will not allow tricksters to operate in the Central Province and we expect public cooperation to arrest this situation.”