Lagos State police command is investigating three new generation banks for alleged fraud and money laundering of US$450,267.82, which is about N162,765,000. Already, two persons, including a bank worker, have been arrested in connection with the fraud and they are being quizzed by the Area ‘F’ Police Commander, ACP Akinbayo Olasoji, who is the lead investigator of the case.

A police source at command headquarters, Ikeja, who spoke on the condition of anonymity as he was not permitted to speak with newsmen, said: “As I speak with you, two bank workers are with the Area F Commander, who is personally investigating the case. It is a serious cartel of three banks. The banks are being investigated as they assisted in laundering the money, which they knew was proceeds of fraud.

“If not for our investigation, the bank was enjoying the proceeds of crime. Money laundering is a serious crime. The police are investigating so as to bring those involved in the crime to book. How can a bank worker have as much as N1 billion in his account? How much is his salary for life? We need to do something to fish out the bad eggs in the financial institutions,” the source said.

Meanwhile, a spokesman of one of the affected banks exonerated his bank from the dirty deal. According to him, “We have no hand in the fraud. The transaction was not carried out by our bank. It was carried out using another bank. One of the suspects is our employee but he did not carry out the transaction in the name of the bank, he did it in his personal capacity.”

In this article: