FUP and MUP RS arrest four individuals for social media fraud

Police officers of the Federal Police Administration, in cooperation with police officers of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republika Srpska, after a months-long investigation, began implementing a joint operational action codenamed „Freud“, related to the criminal offense of „Organized Crime“, in connection with the criminal offenses of „Extortion“ and „Fraud“ under the Criminal Code of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the FUP announced. 

"These activities are being conducted under the supervision of the District Prosecutor's Office in Trebinje, which provides legal assistance to the acting Prosecutor's Office of the West Herzegovina Canton in Široki Brijeg. As part of this action, searches were carried out at four locations in the municipality of Foča, Republika Srpska, and four individuals from Foča with initials N.D., M.D., D.V., and B.M. were deprived of their liberty. They will be escorted by police officers of the Uniformed Police Sector of the FUP from the Foča Police Station to the premises of the Federal Police Administration in Mostar, where criminal processing will continue, after which they will be handed over within the legal deadline to the Cantonal Prosecutor's Office of the West Herzegovina Canton along with a Report on the committed criminal offense", the statement said. 

During the searches, items originating from the aforementioned criminal offenses were found and seized, including a larger quantity of counterfeit money and other objects.

"For the individuals against whom these activities are being undertaken, there are grounds for suspicion that, as members of an organized criminal group, with the aim of obtaining unlawful property gain, they committed multiple criminal offenses by continuously posting advertisements on Facebook profiles for guaranteed predictions of sports results, on which they posted photos of winning sports betting slips as well as photos and posts of winners of monetary prizes from sports result predictions.

The suspects used Facebook profiles to establish contact with individuals (potential fraud victims) who accepted information from these profiles as truthful. After establishing contact with potential victims, they would convince them that these were serious organizations engaged in predicting sports results, all in order to get them to cooperate. When potential victims agreed, they would use extortion to force them into further cooperation, thereby obtaining larger sums of money from them."

Activities on the implementation of this operational action are ongoing.