KUALA LUMPUR: Another “Tan Sri” and a “Datuk Seri” are the latest arrests under Ops Northern Star, which has now seen RM3.5bil in assets including a hotel and durian plantations linked to the MBI investment scheme being seized.
IGP secretariat’s Anti-Money Laundering (AMLA) division head Comm Datuk Muhammad Hasbullah Ali said the “Tan Sri” and “Datuk Seri” were among five caught during the second round of arrests between April 18 and April 21.
This brings the number of suspects arrested to 13, with eight previously caught between March 21 and April 5.
“They (the latest arrested) have been remanded for between five and six days to assist investigations,” Comm Muhammad Hasbullah told a press conference at the division’s headquarters here yesterday.
Among the assets seized this round were durian plantations in Pahang, Penang and Kedah worth RM223,624,167.75.
An additional 299 bank accounts with RM123,614,594.35 were also frozen, he said.
All these assets were believed to have been purchased or had links to the proceeds from the scheme’s illegal gains.
Investigations showed that the “Tan Sri”, a businessman, had been acting as both partner to the investment scam and a proxy to the victims.
As of now, no other “influential figures” such as politicians are on the police’s radar and others who were being pursued are businessmen, said Comm Muhammad Hasbullah.
Previously, the police arrested another “Tan Sri” and further checks showed that he had no direct links to the scam, but he had actually attempted to swindle one of the suspects.
Investigations showed that the “Tan Sri” had offered to make the suspect’s case “go away” for RM25mill.
“The suspect had paid RM10mill as a deposit,” said Comm Muhammad Hasbullah, adding that the suspect told the police of the deal when he was arrested.
The “Tan Sri” was later picked up following the suspect’s police report.
Comm Muhammad Hasbullah explained that the MBI investment scheme scam had been investigated for around eight years, but only six police reports had been lodged in Malaysia. Several reports had been retracted by the complainants.
“From what we have received from the Interpol Red Notice, there were around 11 million victims from neighboring countries,” he said.
He also said it is possible that more assets would be seized as investigations continue.
“We believe the total could go up to several more billions.”
To date, the seizures in Ops Northern have totalled RM3.5bil, among which are a hotel, a developer’s office and a palm oil factory.
On April 11, Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Razarudin Husain said eight suspects, including those with the title of “Datuk”, had been arrested as part of investigations into the MBI investment scam.
Last year, fugitive businessman and founder of MBI, Penang-born Tedy Teow, was extradited to China from Thailand to assist in investigations there on scammed Chinese nationals.
Investors claimed that some two million in China had been cheated by Teow involving a sum of 500 billion yuan (RM307bil).
Some of the investors flew to Malaysia to search for Teow in 2019 in a bid to recover their investments into MBI’s online pyramid scheme.
Through Interpol, the Chinese police sought to arrest Teow by issuing a red notice on Nov 9, 2020.
Teow operated a hotel, theme park, furniture business, property development and entertainment complexes, including a resort in Danok near the Thailand-Malaysia border.
He also built a sprawling business empire from dubious online investment schemes that attracted investors from China, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and Macau.
Thai police arrested Teow on July 21, 2022, for allegedly operating an online casino and money laundering operation after raiding MBI’s office in Songkhla.
