MAN IN COURT FOR CYBER THEFT

A collaboration between the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) and the Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) has led to the arrest of a 22-year-old unemployed, Bismark Nyarko, also known as Bismark Essuman, for an alleged cyber theft involving 591,185 Canadian dollars.
The accused person was alleged to have used Bismark Nyarko interchangeably with his own name, Bismark Essuman, to engage in online purchases of goods from Canada using stolen credit cards to effect payment and shipping to Ghana.
According to the RCMP, the accused person abused about 2000 credit cards.
The SFO was provided with particulars of Bismark, who was arrested on May 10, 2007 when he went to take delivery of one of his parcels, which had arrived in the country.
Bismark was yesterday arraigned at an Accra circuit court on a stealing charge and was remanded into police custody to reappear on June 5, 2007. His plea was not taken.
Dr Gabriel Dzandu of the SFO told the court, presided over by Mr Justice Frank Manu, Chairman of the Greater Accra Regional Tribunal with additional responsibility as circuit court judge, that the accused person had been unemployed after completing his senior secondary school education in 2002.
He said during the latter part of 2006 and February 2007, the SFO received intelligence report from the RCMP that among some suspects, the accused person used Bismark Nyarko interchangeably with his own name Bismark Essuman to engage in online purchase of goods from Canada.
Dr Dzandu said based on detailed information, the SFO did some background checks on the accused person during which a system was put in place to ensure his arrest if and when he appeared to take delivery of some of the stolen parcels.
The prosecutor said on his arrest the accused person admitted the offence and disclosed that he made a living through the use of the Internet.
According to Dr Dzandu, the accused person said by some means he managed to obtain the stolen cards from reportedly “collaborators in Vietnam” and then proceeded to make purchases of merchandise goods such as laptops, cameras, pen drives and personal effects from shops in Canada.
He said the accused person then linked up with his “pen pals” domiciled in Canada for them to ship the items to him in Ghana.
Dr Dzandu said the accused person also used a Ghanaian passport number H1772569 in the name of his brother, Bismark Nyarko, but with his (Bismark Essuman’s) own picture affixed on it to take delivery of the items.
He said in the course of the investigations, a laptop and two mobile phones, which the suspect admitted were part of the items he procured through the illegal activity, as well as a bank savings pass book, were found in his (Bismark’s) house.