A man from Bender was detained on suspicion that he stole 100,000 lei from the bank card of an old man from Hâncesti. He introduced himself as an employee of the National Bank of Moldova and told the man that he noticed that someone was trying to take a bank loan in his name. Thus, he managed to obtain identity and bank data from the old man, IPN reports.

According to the Prosecutor’s Office for Organized Crime and Special Cases, it happened in March 2024, when the victim was contacted by phone. The members of the criminal group, to which the detained man belonged, allegedly used the obtained data to create an account on the phone application.

Half an hour after the phone conversation, the suspect, a 41-year-old man, entered a number of stores in Anenii-Noi and bought three expensive phones and accessories, in the amount of about 80,000 lei. Subsequently, about 15,000 thousand lei was transferred from the victim’s account to Kazakhstan.

The day after he was called, the old man contacted his bank, which informed him about the made purchases. The man notified the law enforcement agencies.

The suspect was identified and was listed wanted by the Anenii-Noi Police Inspectorate. He was recently detained at the Costesti-Stânca customs post in northern Moldova, when he attempted to leave for Romania. The suspect was placed in pre-trial detention for 30 days.

The investigations continue within the basic case, which concerns similar scams through which about 1 million lei was stolen.