"Learned friend" outsmarted

A Kumasi lawyer was on 22 November, allegedly swindled of $24,000 and a post-dated cheque for $600 by a black marketer and an accomplice under the pretext of changing the foreign cash into cedis for him.

The swindlers were said to have presented the victim (name withheld) with a travelling bag containing bundles of papers cut into size of a ?5,000 note with both sides covered with genuine ?5,000 notes. The black marketer, Alex Owusu and his accomplice whose name is unknown, are said to be on the run.

According to police sources, the victim informed Owusu, whom he knew, of his intention to have his $24,000 and a post-dated cheque for $600 changed into cedis in the morning of 22 November.

After settling on ?8,700 as the exchange rate for each dollar, they arranged to meet at the Kumasi Polytechnic campus in the evening for the final transaction.

At the campus Owusu, in the company of another man, handed over a travelling bag supposed to be containing the cedi equivalent of the foreign cash to the victim. The lawyer, in turn, handed the foreign cash over to Owusu after which they parted company in their cars.

Later in the evening, the lawyer detected that the handles purported to be money were rather pieces of papers covered on each side with genuine ? 5,000 notes. After fruitless attempts to trace Owusu, the victim lodged a complaint with the Zongo Police and handed over the fake money to them.