Seberang Perai Utara district police chief Mohd Radzi Ahmad said the retirees, in their 60s, had lodged separate police reports on March 7 after realising that money in their bank accounts had been withdrawn in stages through transfers.

“In the first incident, the victim was duped of RM148,000 when she initially received a call from a woman, who introduced herself as a prosecuting officer, to say that she was involved in a corruption case and money laundering before asking her to cooperate to avoid arrest.

“The caller instructed the woman to open a new bank account and transfer all her money into it for investigation purposes and to prevent the money from being confiscated. The victim followed the instructions and gave her new banking details to the scammer,” he said in a statement today.

He said the victim lodged a report after realising that her entire savings amounting to RM148,009 had been transferred to her new account in stages and withdrawn.

Radzi said the second woman lost RM242,500 after she was contacted by a man who claimed to be an insurance agent informing her that she was involved in a fraudulent claim and drugs.

The caller instructed the victim to reactivate a dormant account belonging to her by depositing RM280,000 as “bail” to avoid being arrested. She transferred her savings and borrowings totalling RM242,500 to the account and revealed her banking details.

“The victim only realised that she had been duped after she tried to deposit the remaining ‘bail’ amount of RM37,500, which she borrowed from family members. She found out that all RM242,500 had been withdrawn through money transfers,” he said.

Both cases are being investigated under Section 420 of the Penal Code.