KUCHING: Police have crippled an online gambling syndicate operating a calling centre from two apartments along Jalan Song here following coordinated raids on Monday (Dec 22).
The operation, dubbed ‘Ops Dadu Mega’, was carried out by the district Criminal Investigation Division (CID) with support from the Sarawak CID’s D7 branch at 2 pm.
It led to the arrest of three local men and 25 foreigners — 24 men and one woman — aged between 19 and 40, all believed to have been working full-time for the syndicate.
Kuching police chief Alexson Naga Chabu said police seized numerous computers, mobile phones and related devices suspected to have been used to run online gambling operations.
“Preliminary investigations found that the syndicate had been operating the calling centre for about four months.
“They used WhatsApp and websites to promote various forms of online gambling to targeted customers in Australia and China,” he said.
The case is being investigated under Section 4(1)(g) of the Common Gaming Houses Act 1953 for promoting gambling activities, as well as Section 6(1)(c) and Section 15(1)(c) of the Immigration Act 1959/63 for staying in Malaysia without a valid permit and overstaying.
All suspects were brought before the Kuching Magistrate’s Court yesterday (Dec 23), where a three-day remand order was granted to facilitate investigations.
In light of this, Alexson urged members of the public with information on criminal activities to report them to the Kuching police control centre at 082-244444.
