Pakistani foreign exchange scam suspects arrested in Pattaya

[webfact]

Pakistani Foreign Exchange Scam suspects caught by Pattaya Police



PATTAYA: -- A couple, thought to be brother and sister from Pakistan, were arrested by Pattaya Police in the early hours of Friday, accused of stealing 32,000 Baht from a foreign exchange booth on Pattaya Beach.

Mr. Fareed aged 28 and Miss Naseem Muhammad Ali aged 19 were arrested in front of a Car Rental Shop on the Tepprasit Road in Jomtien on Thursday on the strength of arrest warrant number 518/2556 dated 8th August 2013 which states the pair are wanted in connection with the alleged theft of 32,000 Baht from the “Top” Currency Exchange Booth on Pattaya Beach which occurred on 3rd August.

The pair are thought to have approached the booth and informed the counter assistant, Khun Alaya aged 28, that they wanted to exchange a considerable amount of foreign currency but first wanted to inspect Thai Baht Notes as they were unfamiliar with the money.

Khun Alaya handed over 100,000 Baht in Thai Currency for them to inspect. The pair were allegedly able to remove 32,000 Baht from the batch of notes which were then handed back to the assistant before the pair left.

Full story: http://www.pattayaone.net/pattaya-news/98424/pakistani-foreign-exchange-scam-suspects-caught-pattaya-police/


-- Pattaya One 2013-08-09

[pedro01]

Lol - nothing fishy about the employee in a foreign exchange handing over 100k for a customer to inspect

[hanno]

There is some BS there somewhere. Hand over 100K for inspection? Yeah, right!

[Songhua]

Yes, our banknotes are very attractive I'll stay locked in my booth which prevents me being robbed while I let you hold ฿100,000.

<deleted>?

[Ohio]

Glad Pattaya is by the sea it explains the 'fishy' smell about this.

But that is a Heck of a 'POINT' so there must be something in it.

[jmccarty]

Dumb blondes!

[Jonesy99]

"Khun Alaya handed over 100,000 Baht in Thai Currency for them to inspect."

Literally nearly spat my coffee out.

[Suradit69]

"Khun Alaya handed over 100,000 Baht in Thai Currency for them to inspect."

Literally nearly spat my coffee out.

I expect (hope) her employers are currently reviewing her conditions of employment and interviewing replacements.

Maybe they could update the training manual as well.

To be fair though, this was a report from Pattaya One, so the story may have only a tenuous relationship to what actually happened.

[zaZa9]

100,000 ???

Yes....1 of each Thai Banknote wouldnt be enough of a sample to look at now , would it.

[Kawapete]

New ways of getting money on hand is sometimes close to funny : "I would like to inspect some millions for a while, see you later"

[jacko45k]

So was it... 'here are 100 of them for you to look over while I go to the bathroom'.

You have to say the cashier is partly to blame for being a complete and utter idiot.

Edited August 9, 2013 by jacko45k

[Baerboxer]

How exactly are they going to prove this?

Cashier hands over a wad of notes so they can "inspect" them - value 100k and they remove one third, value 32k. Was this caught on cctv? Were the notes marked in some way? Any witnesses? If not, it is the word of a cashier with a somewhat implausible story against two tourists.

[marell]

This story, as is, doesn't float. Seems obvious there are more than a few relevant facts missing here. Hopefully something more believable will come to light. But probably not.

Edited August 9, 2013 by marell

[Joe Mamma]

After a life of catching crooks,frauds,thieves and all the other dysfunctional people that prey on you honest folks. I was hoping to retire here and get away from the riff-raff that undermine this world. Hate to see the foreign scum ruin this country too.

I am sure many of you agree your home countries were invaded by the non cream of the crop. These and the home grown scum gave me 45 years of career, is the only positive thing .

[bander]

"arrest warrant number 518/2556 dated 8th August 2013"

Why we get this warrant number all the time?

Is it some kind of confirmation from the BIB how many arrests they make every year?

WOW.... 518 arrests so far this year in Pattaya, they must be really busy

[lemoncake]

All booths have CCTV , so it should not be hard to determine what actually took place.

Strange though that booth employee was not also arrested, who and where in their right mind hands over 100K with no security at all

[lemoncake]

"arrest warrant number 518/2556 dated 8th August 2013"

Why we get this warrant number all the time?

Is it some kind of confirmation from the BIB how many arrests they make every year?

WOW.... 518 arrests so far this year in Pattaya, they must be really busy

2556 is the year , 8 is the date of issue and 51 is probably the actual warrant number on that day or month

[paulyd2k]

phew, it`s that easy is it, anyone know where I can get 100,000 dodgy baht notes,lol

[Dumu Ali]

Even the money changers in LOS are scammers - Thailand the Hub of Currency Exchange

[BuddhaMind]

OK, maybe it's today, and I'm feeling sensitive or something, but these stories and pictures coming out of Thailand are starting to disgust me. The photo alone pisses me off. Pair of foreigners sitting at a table with their passports sitting up for all to see, a girl standing and pointing, with a bunch of Thai guys in the back, all posing for a picture. What's the point? Ego? To show how hard everyone is working? To prove a point, or god forbid, to prove the foreigners are guilty? And then the copy, which reads that these two went to an exchange booth and the worker forked over 100K baht for inspection?!!! It's like a circus. What part of Thai culture am I missing? I don't believe a word of it. So nice work Thai authorities, for looking, again, like imbeciles.

Edited August 9, 2013 by Rimmer
Profanity

[Wavefloater]

"arrest warrant number 518/2556 dated 8th August 2013"

Why we get this warrant number all the time?

Is it some kind of confirmation from the BIB how many arrests they make every year?

WOW.... 518 arrests so far this year in Pattaya, they must be really busy

It's because Pattaya One News appears to be nothing more that a "BiB puppet". It seems they just go wherever they're told to go and write what they're told to write. IMO, not an ounce of true journalism there. Shameful really.

Now back to the story. So, when the girl at at he kiosk got the stack of 1000's back, she couldn't tell right away it was 1/3 smaller or lighter? Seriously? Well, I guess if she was stupid enough to hand it to the Pakistani couple in the first place, you can't expect that any of her brain cells are working.

The whole story seems preposterous. Perhaps the kiosk girl stole the money and is using the Pakistani couple as a scapegoat. Maybe the Pakistanis should be pointing back at her --either accusing her of being so stupid it's almost criminal or accusing her of setting them up.

[Suradit69]

OK, maybe it's today, and I'm feeling sensitive or something, but these stories and pictures coming out of Thailand are starting to disgust me. The photo alone pisses me off. Pair of foreigners sitting at a table with their passports sitting up for all to see, a girl standing and pointing, with a bunch of Thai guys in the back, all posing for a picture. What's the point? Ego? To show how hard everyone is working? To prove a point, or god forbid, to prove the foreigners are guilty? And then the copy, which reads that these two went to an exchange booth and the worker forked over 100K baht for inspection?!!! It's like a circus. What part of Thai culture am I missing? I don't believe a f*&king word of it. So nice work Thai authorities, for looking, again, like imbeciles.

"So nice work Thai authorities, for looking, again, like imbeciles."

And nice work BuddhaMind (given your rant, you should consider a change of names) reacting in a mature, Zen-like manner.

Quite often the guys sitting at the table are Thai with a foreigner pointing at them, and whoever they are, they were caught doing something (allegedly) that was dishonest.

Why does that get your knickers in a bunch? What's the point? Poor self-esteem that depends on your exalted status as a foreigner? Agreed the photos serve no useful purpose, but then some foreign media is hardly a step up the ladder of sensibility.

Are the US, Australian and UK "authorities" looking like imbeciles because the press in those countries uses its freedom to no useful purpose?

Edited August 9, 2013 by Suradit69

[Rimmer]

Some inflammatory and reported posts removed, also quoted replies

[dick turpin]

So here's how...

Kiosk girl hands over 10 wads of 10,000 baht for inspection.

Pakistani couple are already prepared with four dud wads,

each with a genuine note on top and bottom. A simple piece

of distraction and they drop four genuine wads into their bag.

They grab 40,000 baht less the 8,000 baht wrapped around the

four dud wads, then hand back 10 wads to kiosk girl who thinks

she has had money in sight all the time. Like all good scams

over in a matter of seconds.

[hanno]

OK, maybe it's today, and I'm feeling sensitive or something, but these stories and pictures coming out of Thailand are starting to disgust me. The photo alone pisses me off. Pair of foreigners sitting at a table with their passports sitting up for all to see, a girl standing and pointing, with a bunch of Thai guys in the back, all posing for a picture. What's the point? Ego? To show how hard everyone is working? To prove a point, or god forbid, to prove the foreigners are guilty? And then the copy, which reads that these two went to an exchange booth and the worker forked over 100K baht for inspection?!!! It's like a circus. What part of Thai culture am I missing? I don't believe a f*&king word of it. So nice work Thai authorities, for looking, again, like imbeciles.

"So nice work Thai authorities, for looking, again, like imbeciles."

And nice work BuddhaMind (given your rant, you should consider a change of names) reacting in a mature, Zen-like manner.

Quite often the guys sitting at the table are Thai with a foreigner pointing at them, and whoever they are, they were caught doing something (allegedly) that was dishonest.

Why does that get your knickers in a bunch? What's the point? Poor self-esteem that depends on your exalted status as a foreigner? Agreed the photos serve no useful purpose, but then some foreign media is hardly a step up the ladder of sensibility.

Are the US, Australian and UK "authorities" looking like imbeciles because the press in those countries uses its freedom to no useful purpose?

[fakename]

So, Mr Dick, did you mean that the girl in the kiosk gave them 10 wads of 1000 baht notes? I never seen a "wad" of only 10 notes. Have you actually tried this trick before, or just guessing that its easy? Either the story is completely wrong, or the kiosk girl was trying to scam the tourist. Sure, there is a very slim chance that the tourist were rip-artist, but who would give someone 100k to look at?

[lemoncake]

The problem with this kind of cases is that if the accused deny the charges, they are thrown into jail, denied bail and await trial to prove their innocence.

The trial may take 1-3 years to come.

If they admit guilt,they will be sentenced in the same week.

So for the accused there is no win situation and if they do await trial and are freed, they are not compensated in any way for up to 3 years they served in jail, will be lucky to get an apology

[DGIE]

I don't believe that Khun kallaya handed 100K Baht to let the 2 to inspect

[Bodrules]

Either Pattaya One have gone all Daily Mail on us and gotten the details garbled (again), this story has as many holes in it as my tales of woe when I was kid trying to convince the teacher why the homework hadn't been done, was nothing to do with me as [the dog ate it / dropped it in the river / car broke down coming bank from grans etc]

[ajarnmark]

Well, these must be really genius criminals... <deleted>, the picture itself disgusts me... look at the way that thai girl is pointing to the pair and by the looks of it, I dont think that they did anything wrong...

The whole story maybe worth believing in the home town of Araya (??) but not anywhere else... or is this the same case as WMD in Iraq...