Police have rescued five people in Taipei and nine in Kaohsiung who had been locked up by criminal groups that used their bank accounts for money laundering.
Both cases involve people applying for fake job interviews.
In the Taipei case, police on Wednesday rescued five people, two men and three women, who said they were forcibly confined inside rooms at a hostel. Seven alleged members of a criminal ring, believed to be headed by a 31-year-old man surnamed Chang (張), were arrested.
Two modified handguns, one replica toy rifle, nine bullets, a homemade explosive device and metal brass rings were seized during the raid, Chen Jen-chia (陳人嘉), head of the criminal investigation section of the Taipei Nangang Police Precinct (南港分局), told a media briefing yesterday.
Police seized account books, bank receipts, cash, mobile phones and computers, suspecting the group of investment fraud, money laundering and other illegal financial activities, Chen said.
Pouches of suspected illegal substances were also found, and lab tests confirmed the presence of heroin and amphetamine. The seven suspects consequently also face narcotics charges, he added.
The precinct had received reports of people applying for an apparent job vacancy posted on social media, but then being threatened and confined in a hostel room.
Detectives pinpointed the confinement location, where victims were kept in large rooms with several bunk beds, leading to Wednesday’s raid and the five captives being freed.
Preliminary findings and surveillance indicated a similar pattern among criminal rings over the past year involving investment fraud and money laundering, he said.
“The five people who were confined are young, all between 20 and 30 years old. They seemed very relieved when police broke into the room. They were very scared and had no idea how long they would be held there,” Chen said.
The freed captives told police that they applied for a job ad promising NT$40,000 per month for “typing and data entry work.” When they applied by phone, they were invited to an interview and asked to bring their bank card and account book, Chen said.
When they arrived for the interview, they were met by people brandishing guns who took them to the hostel by force.
The suspects used the applicants’ bank accounts for dubious transactions and money laundering, the captives told investigators.
Chen said the seven suspects are likely to face charges of organized crime, fraud and money laundering, along with firearms and illegal drugs violations.
In the Kaohsiung case, police on Thursday rescued nine people allegedly being confined in a commercial building in the city’s Lingya District (苓雅), with a 40-year-old man surnamed Sun (孫) the main suspect.
Police were tipped off after a man surnamed Kuo (郭) managed to call his family for help and gave them the building’s address. The man said he had applied for a job that promised NT$100,000 pay, but he was told to bring his bank card and account book.
Investigators are still working to verify the identities of the nine people, including Kuo, as questions remained about their involvement with Sun.
It is believed that some of Sun’s alleged accomplices were not in the building when the raid took place, and they might still be on the run, Kaohsiung Lingya police station chief Fang Tse-hsiung (方哲雄) told a media briefing yesterday.
Kuo told police that he and the other eight people met Sun when they showed up at the address, at a suite of an 85-story commercial tower.
Kuo told police that he and the other eight remained in the room because Sun promised them their NT$100,000 would be paid the next day, but also because he threatened them with violence if they tried to leave.
Fang said Sun is suspected of heading an investment fraud operation that used victims’ bank accounts for money laundering in collusion with other criminal rings.
Fang said no firearms or other weapons were found on Sun, which raised doubts about the claims of forcible confinement, especially since Kuo said that most of them continued to wait because they needed the money, but realized too late that they had fallen for a fraud scheme.
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