Romance scams: Crime expert insists bank staff are not clean, and must be probed by Hawks and FSCA

A crime expert has questioned the role of bank officials in widespread romance scams which have left numerous women across South Africa destitute, after their hard-earned money including pensions is stolen.

Since last year, IOL has been running the scammed series where several women and men have lost millions of rand earned from pensions and bank loans. The victims have regrouped and are knocking on different doors, demanding answers.

Part of the victims’ complaints include allegations against FNB, who the victims insist was the bank preferred by the scammers. Many of the scammed victims did not have FNB accounts, but during the complicated scams, they were enticed by the scammers to open and transact using FNB.

Romance scams, also referred to as dating scams or love scams, are a common fraudulent scheme where a person, especially women, are met by strangers who propose love to them. In the many cases investigated by IOL, the scammers who have since vanished, were foreign nationals who avowed love to the employed women in different cities across South Africa.

As the love blossoms, with regular promises of fancy wedding ceremonies and blissful, lifelong marriages, the unsuspecting women are persuaded to either resign or take out bank loans so that the money would be invested into the “lovebirds” business venture to support their upcoming family.

In the IOL series, the scammed women and men have joined hands and are speaking out against the rampant romance scams targeting unsuspecting, working women particularly State employees. The targeted women who are often single mothers and breadwinners in their households, are left destitute, emotionally traumatised, with some women reportedly committed suicide after being scammed.

On Monday, IOL reported that a North West based woman, aged 64, is languishing in abject poverty and demanding answers from FNB after scammers allegedly transferred her R2 million pension without her knowledge.

On Tuesday, IOL also reported that another woman, former teacher, Refilwe insists FNB should have protected her when on three instances in one week, she was escorted into two branches in Joburg to withdraw an amount exceeding R2 million from her bank account, and she lost all the money to cunning scammers.

Tearfully narrating her ordeal to IOL, Refilwe (not her real name but her full details have been given to FNB) said prior to going to the FNB branches in Joburg, several rituals were performed on her and the criminals assured her that she would be permitted to withdraw the money without making a prior appointment with the bank.

In an interview with IOL, Calvin Rafadi who is a research associate at the University of Johannesburg said banks have some questions to answer to authorities.

“This is more and more of the syndicates operating in South Africa because they recruit one another as women are being more and more vulnerable. In incidents where large amounts of cash are withdrawn from the banks, the criminals make sure that most of their activities are not done through EFTs but they get the actual cash,” he said.

“Remember, if electronic transfers are done, law enforcement will need to zoom in on the people who own the accounts where the money was transferred to. The criminals are working in cahoots with bank managers and bank tellers. When someone walks into a bank to withdraw a cash amount exceeding R25,000 and that account is not a business account, in such scenarios the banks are obliged in law to report such transactions within 48 hours.”

Rafadi said it is strange when the victims of crime allege they had not made any prior arrangements to withdraw large amounts, but were handed the money, often times while they were being escorted by the criminals.

“The reason why some of these people (bank officials) do not even report these transactions which are tantamount to money laundering, it turns out to be negligence on the part of tellers or bank managers. Once a bank has become aware of suspicious transactions, or large amounts being withdrawn in cash, they must report to the Financial Intelligence Centre,” he said.

“If the banks did not do so, should they be found guilty by the banking ombudsman for failure to report, there is a fine of up to R100 million or jail time. The crime syndicates make sure they have a connection with some of the tellers and the bank managers, just for the bank officials to look the other side and not report such transactions. The bank officials enable the money to be withdrawn in a short space of time.”

He said it is questionable, as some of the victims allege, that they were escorted into the banks by the criminals. In one case, a woman insists that after withdrawing large amounts of money, the cash was not handed to her, but the FNB officials allegedly handed the money to the criminals – who they seemed familiar with.

Rafadi said by escorting the victims into the banks, the criminals will be directing the besieged women to specific tellers and managers who they work with behind the scenes.

“The bank officials are under the belief that there will not be a come-back because of the stigma around the reporting of romance scams. Most of the victims are scared or deeply embarrassed to report the cases to the police. Remember, in these cases, some of the criminals have the women’s naked pictures or compromising information so the victims are also blackmailed against reporting to authorities.

“Women run the risk of having their money stolen, and at the same time they are blackmailed. The women who have managed to report these cases have been very bold. We see that the women who are reporting to the Hawks 419 scams unit are a lot.”

Refilwe said she was taken to FNB branches in Joburg on three different days in one week and she managed to withdraw R2 million in cash – without making any appointment.

“I met the scammer Jacob in February 2022, and I was scammed in April 2023. I had received R2.5 million as proceeds from sales of my property in Rustenburg on March 29, 2023. I had bought the property from my pension fund. The property was valued at R4 million, but I was persuaded by the scammer boyfriend to sell the property for only R2.5 million,” she said.

The 67-year-old woman said she was persuaded to sell her Rustenburg property so that she could buy a new property in Johannesburg. The Joburg property which Refilwe was enticed with, could also be used for business.

“On April 3, 2023, I was then invited by the scammers to come to Johannesburg to kick start the process of buying the Joburg property. When I arrived in Joburg, my boyfriend, Jacob, who I had met on a Christian dating site CDFF (Christian Dating for Free) came and fetched me after I was dropped by a taxi,” she said.

In that room, Refilwe was told that she must bring the R2.5 million which was in her bank account. 

“I was then instructed to go to the FNB branch in Greenstone to make a cash withdrawal of R150,000 on April 4, 2023. I was accompanied into the bank by two of the scammers. I had not made any booking, but I was given R130,000 over the counter,” she said.

Two days later, the pensioner said she was ordered to go and withdraw R2 million.

“On April 6, 2023, the scammers instructed me to make a cash withdrawal of R2 million. I argued that it would not be feasible to withdraw such a huge amount of cash without booking but the scammers insisted that I should not worry. The scammers said they had already arranged everything with FNB, and they know people.”

The pensioner was then driven to an FNB branch at Sandton. She told the bank teller that she needed to withdraw R2 million cash, and she was told to wait.

“I was called by a bank teller who gave me R1.4 million in cash. The scammers who had escorted me into the bank had a suitcase, but it was not big enough to contain the money. They squeezed money into the bag. Everything was happening very fast. From there, I was taken to the car, and we drove away.

"Two days later, on April 8, 2023, the scammers took me to the FNB branch at Sandton for a cash withdrawal of R600,000,” she said.

In December, contacted FNB with the numerous allegations raised by scammed women who are clients of the bank. FNB requested information on the specific clients, which was supplied to FNB in the form of a dossier. In response, FNB then told IOL that it has stringent measures against crime but said it would not discuss specific issues with IOL.

jonisayi.maromo@iol.co.za 

IOL