Liberec, North Bohemia, March 23 (CTK) – Czech detectives caught three foreigners based in Prague who presented themselves as used car dealers online and lured millions of crowns from people to whom they promised cars for low prices, Liberec regional police spokeswoman Ivana Balakova said on Thursday.
The foreigners demanded advance payments and later asked for the rest of the price to be paid, saying they had problems with importing the cars in the country. None of their clients has ever received the car, Balakova said on the police website.
The police blocked 25 bank accounts with more than three million crowns within the suspected fraud.
The criminal group probably cheated people from several European countries, including Austria, Britain, Slovakia and Spain, and it may have cooperated with a similar gang of four foreigners who operated in Brno and were arrested in February.
In the Prague flat of the group, the detectives revealed forged identity cards, cash, mobile phones, computers, printers and a facility that might have been used for forging of IDs.
“One of the foreigners had eight different identity cards at the moment of his arrest. The police know of further five false identities that he used,” Balakova said.
