Agency racket busted

Sarath Malalasekera

The Colombo Fraud Investigation Bureau (CFIB) has uncovered a massive agency racket following the arrest of two suspects, a father and the son, from the Kandy Police Division. According to the investigation directed by CFIB Director Senior SP Maxie Proctor, a father, son and several other members of the same family had operated a agency office in the Wellawatta police area for several months and had collected over Rs 2.3 million from 39 persons promising to send them to England for higher studies. The CFIB had received 39 complaints upto yesterday.

There are several other complaints made to a number of police stations including Kurunegala, Kandy and Matale, the CFIB Director said.

Investigations also revealed that the suspects had changed residence from time to time in order to avoid arrest. Finally a special police team led by Inspector HLGC Gamage, Sergeant AP Pathirana and several other officers attached to the CFIB arrested the two suspects at Annewatta in Kandy.

ASP Sanjey Weerasinghe, Chief Inspector Sarath Perera, D S Nugera, OIC CFIB, SI Ekanayake of the CFIB also participated at the press conference held yesterday. About 25 employees had been working in this luxury agency office in Wellawatta, CFIB officers said.

The two suspects had been detained until the completion of the ongoing investigations. “We are looking for several other suspects including the daughter of the first suspect now in custody,” the CFIB officers said.