Two ‘tourist’ sisters colluded with an Arab scammer to launder more than BD21,800 by illicitly buying 77 smartphones online using stolen credit card information, the court heard.
Yesterday, the High Criminal Court found the Syrian women and a Jordanian man guilty for their involvement in the fraudulent scheme.
The 26-year-old man was sentenced in absentia to six years behind bars and fined BD100,000, while the women were each sentenced to four years behind bars.
The court also ordered that BD21,847 be confiscated from the defendants’ assets, and ruled to deport the two women after completing their prison term.
The court heard that the man, who is still in Jordan, purchased mobile phones online from a well-known electronics retailer, and arranged for the devices to be delivered to the women.
The sisters, aged 35 and 39, were sent to Bahrain on tourist visas to execute the second part of the defendant’s plan – to resell the phones and transfer a portion of the revenue to him.
After taking a cut from their ill-begotten gains, they reportedly managed to convince well-meaning buyers to transfer the money abroad themselves, claiming that they were on tourist visas and could not make their own transfers.
Some of the money was also transported to their co-defendant with the help of unwitting accomplices.
The man was found guilty of stealing from Jordanian, Saudi and Emirati bank accounts, between September to December 2024 after illicitly obtaining private ATM card credentials.
A total of BD31,000 in devices was purchased from the retailer, though the women reportedly only wired BD21,846.639 to Jordan at the time of their arrest – the product of the sale of 71 devices.
The two Syrians were convicted of facilitating the Jordanian man’s fraudulent schemes, in an attempt to make the cash he stole appear legitimate in the eyes of the authorities.
They were found guilty of further aiding and abetting their co-defendant by purchasing Bahraini phone numbers and giving him their information and address for the deliveries.
In Public Prosecution hearings, the older sister admitted to coming to Bahrain on the behest of a man, receiving shipments on his behalf and selling the smartphones.
She subtracted an agreed-upon percentage of the sales, she admitted, and ultimately sent the money to family members in the UAE.
The GDN earlier reported that the plot unravelled when the store’s payment service provider, Eazy Pay, received a letter from the authorities in Saudi Arabia about scam incidents that may have occurred on the retailer’s site.
The payment company informed the store that there appeared to be a number of suspicious transactions on the platform, involving the sale of 77 devices worth more than BD31,000.
In turn, the retailer’s security office contacted the National Centre for Financial Intelligence, reporting the pattern of dubious purchases of mobiles from the online store.
An investigation confirmed the payment service provider’s report, and noted that all the devices had been delivered to the sisters.
zainab@gdnmedia.bh
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