Police in Nairobi have arrested a man who has been conning unsuspecting business people while pretending to be a dealer in gold and precious metals, eventually duping them by giving them stones packed in flashy metal boxes disguised as cash.
Edwin Ochieng Oduk was arrested alongside other accomplices on suspicion of illegally obtaining some Sh7.2 million from a French national by the name William Tuil, ostensibly to introduce him into a lucrative business deal involving the export of Coltan, a precious mineral from the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Acting on a tip from the foreigner who claimed Oduk had swindled him of Sh7 million, detectives from the Directorate of Criminal Investigations swung into action and raided the accused’s premises in Nairobi’s Westlands area.
During the raid, several metallic boxes loaded with stones and broken tiles were discovered instead of billions of shillings, the price of the supposed deal.
Detectives recovered 12 metallic boxes in one of the sections in the townhouse used as an office, which they said were mostly used to scam unsuspecting victims of the fictitious minerals deal.
The boxes, some of which were not locked, had stones in them.
After cross-examination, detectives would find out that Oduk and Company use the stones to give their unsuspecting victims an impression of either cash or fake gold weight.
After being signaled by police, the victim said the box he was given was locked in his presence and the keys given to him thousands of miles away in Accra Ghana, before he made his way to Rwanda then Nairobi.
William gave the bunch of keys handed to him by the swindlers to the detectives who after trying them out on the box, the padlocks snapped open.
Investigations show the packaging of the alleged millions was done in Ghana where it was meant to be transported through diplomatic means to Rwanda where William had been told by the scammers to wait for his money before diving into the mines business.
On arrival in Nairobi, Oduk, who police believe is part of a transnational organised criminal gang, contacted him and demanded Sh2.3 million for safekeeping, another Sh2.9 million for insurance and a further Sh1.7 million for a private jet.
Accompanied by another fraudster purporting to be a customs officer, Oduk further demanded Sh87 million for customs and Sh72 million as his commission, amounts which got the victim suspecting hence raising the alarm with the police.
The suspect is set to be arraigned in court today.
In a similar case, in February 2023 Milimani Senior Principal Magistrate Robinson Ondieki released ten suspects allegedly linked to an international fake gold syndicate on bail after rejecting the DCI’s request to continue detaining them at Kamukunji police station pending completion of investigations.
In July 2022 police deported Bupe Chipando, a Zambian national accused of operating an international syndicate of fake gold and money laundering. The Zambian was arrested by detectives after he reportedly defrauded a Dutch national more than Sh170 million in a fake gold deal.
In 2021, a consignment of fake gold bars was seized by detectives from a strong room belonging to Swiss port transit freight station, at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport.