Duo arrested for bank transactions' forgery

KUWAIT: Capital detectives busted a gang that forged bank transactions to get loans and facilities for those who did not qualify to receive them. Capital detectives learned that two expats, a Lebanese named Mohammad Mustafa, born in 1974, and an Egyptian named Ashraf Khalaf, also born in 1974, forged seals of private companies, government establishments and various co-operative societies, through which they forged salary certificates for those who are over the maximum limit to borrow from banks and wish to get new loans. Investigations also indicated that the men had stamps of local banks by which they manipulated the salary amount in bank statements.

One of the suspects used his personal computer to issue forged salary and 'to whom it may concern' certificates and charged from KD 500 to KD 700 per transaction. Sources said based on this information and investigations, Mustafa was arrested and 50 seals were found with him along with two laptops, four printers, papers and transactions under process and KD 1,000. Detectives learned from the first suspect that the second suspect (Khalaf) made the stamps for KD 50 each, and used them to forge transactions. The suspects were sent to concerned authorities, while detectives are still working on the case to arrest those who used their services.

By Hanan Al-Saadoun