Police arrests actor, undergraduate for defrauding traders with fake bank alerts

The Oyo State Police Command has arrested a man, Olumide Olajide, alongside his partner, an undergraduate, Wemimo Adeyanju, for allegedly defrauding traders in Ibadan with fake bank alerts.

Olajide, a self-acclaimed actor of Yoruba movies was among those paraded on Monday, at the state police command headquarters, Eleyele, Ibadan.

The self-acclaimed actor who was paraded alongside his partner Adeyanju, a Higher National Diploma student of Purchasing and Supply at a polytechnic in the South-West, said he was arrested in the Apete area of Ibadan.

Narrating his mode of operation, Olajide said he normally asks for his victim’s account number after purchasing goods from them and in turn uses the information to generate their details by dialing the USSD code of his bank.

He said that after generating the recipient’s name, he would then alter the old bank alert sent to him by his bank and change the date and the amount, and resend the same to the victim.

According to him, the fake alert sent will show on the recipient’s phone as a genuine alert from his bank.

He said, “I did it just three times before I was arrested. After seeing the alert, they would allow me to go away with the goods paid for with the fake bank alert.

“I went to another shop and a woman recognized me through the display photograph on my WhatsApp and raised the alarm.”

Meanwhile, when interrogated Adeyanju admitted that he accompanied Olajide during his scheme, and acknowledged that the prime suspect used fake bank alert in purchasing some items on an occasion that he accompanied him.

“He did it once. He was the one who did it, but I followed him that day,” Adeyanju stated.

However, police sources said Olajide had an app on his phone with which he generates fake bank alerts to defraud traders.