Dangriga man charged in countrywide cheque scam
Most of us are prepared for the thief in the night or the purse snatcher but for several months, local businesses have been schooled by a well-dressed crook with a gift for forging signatures. News Five’s Janelle Chanona reports.
Janelle Chanona, Reporting
This afternoon twenty-nine year old Lino Herrera was formally charged with three counts each of Obtaining Property by Deception, Uttering upon a False Document, Claiming upon a False Document and Possession of False Documents. Police say Herrera is the suspected mastermind behind a bogus cheque scam involving businesses across the country. Merchants allege that the Dangriga resident ripped them off of thousands of dollars in property using different names and forged signatures.
At closing time on Saturday, September twenty-ninth, Lino showed up at Marelco Limited, posing as Elston Longsworth of Placencia. He was sold a sixty horsepower Yamaha boat engine which he paid for using a Government of Belize cheque made out to the company in the sum of sixteen thousand four hundred dollars.
Danny Madrid, Manager, Marelco
“He spent like forty-five minutes in the store, he was well dressed. At no way we could have believed that this guy was a con artist.”
But within days, Marelco found out they had been “whapped” and tipped off the cops. Herrera disappeared until last Friday when he showed up at William Quan on Albert Street. This time he gave the name Lyndon Wade of the Corozal Free Zone Management, who was interested in two sixty horse power Mercury engines. Again, he paid for the items using a Government cheque valued at more than thirty-two thousand dollars. But Quan says he smelled something fishy and followed the customer to an address off Coney Drive. When he learnt the cheque was fake, he told police where to find the con artist.
By then Herrera wasn’t at home, but that same Friday, he did show up at Marine Imports on Hutson Street, again just before closing time, to buy two, two hundred horse power Suzuki engines worth more than seventy-one thousand dollars, which he also paid with a Government cheque.
Since Herrera’s arrest, other G.O.B. cheques made to computer salesman Godwin Moody and H2Tech, used to buy computers and other equipment, have also been handed in to investigators. Alarmingly, tonight police say Herrera was scamming businesses in the Orange Walk, Stann Creek, and Cayo districts.
Aaron Guzman, O.C., CIB
“I expect that by tomorrow he’d appear in court for those other charges and when we’re through with him, we continue assisting San Ignacio Police, Belmopan Police, and Orange Walk Police who had places in their area defrauded the same way. So this investigation is going to take a couple more days for the other districts to round out their part.”
“Obviously he was a good conman because now he’s been caught and he seems to be the person that studied your business and he made inquiries as to your prices and then he would show up with the cheque for a specific item or specific items.”
Four of the missing engines have been recovered, but tonight cops need your help to track down the rest of the stolen property.
Aaron Guzman
“We’d ask that if anybody out there believes that the items they have are a part of this investigation to bring it in and then let us see how we go from there. Because you may have bought something in good faith and now you realise that this is not that way, please come in before we go to you so we realise that you made a mistake and we can go from there.”
Janelle Chanona
“So he was dealing computers? What sort of items?”
Aaron Guzman
“The items taken from business houses in Belize that we are sure we’re gonna charge for are computers. The reports in other districts are building materials, air conditioning units, welding machine, and a riding mower, and the sixty horse power from Marelco has not been recovered as yet.”
Danny Madrid
“Cheques we look at it very closely now. Even if it’s a bank draft from the bank, we would call the bank and verify that, yes, this is a genuine bank draft. Or if somebody sends a cheque from any company, we would try to verify to see if it is correct, because with the modern age, computers you can do a lot of things with it, and it looks very, very, exact like a real cheque.”
Janelle Chanona
“Now Mr. Madrid in this season of shopping, what would you advise your colleagues in the business community to do to protect themselves?”
Danny Madrid
“I would like to tell my colleagues to be very careful, especially with cheques and even credit cards you have to be very careful. … We have to screen the people more and as I said before, we try not to do it in a way that would let the customer look bad or feel bad. So we try to do it in a nice way, it’s a nice interview we do, but we know what we are doing.”
Herrera appeared with his attorney Anthony Sylvestre Jr. this afternoon before Magistrate Sharon Fraser. Reporting for News Five, I am Janelle Chanona.
No pleas were taken from Herrera and he was offered bail of fifty thousand dollars, but up to news time he could not post that amount. The case against the accused has been adjourned until the twenty-first of January. The missing Yamaha engine bears the serial number 6C6-1007402. This afternoon, a press release from the Government Press Office advised the public that Belmopan uses purchase orders, not over the counter cheques, to buy goods.
