Two more reputable organisations, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Coca-Cola Bottling Company Limited, have been identified as the latest victims of the cheque and signature racketeering syndicate which was busted in Accra over the weekend. Police investigations into the dealings of the syndicate, four of whose nine members were nabbed over the weekend, revealed a further GH cedis 220,OO (2.2 billion cedis) stolen from the Barclays Bank accounts of the two firms. The Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) and the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) were the initial victims reported to have lost billions of cedis to the criminal activities of the ring. Police investigations yesterday exposed further amount of GH cedis 170,OOO (1.7 billion cedis) and GH cedis 53,700 (537 million cedis) stolen from the Barclays Bank accounts of the UNDP and Coca-Cola, respectively, between April 25 and May 14, this year. The Director of Operations of the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service, ACOP Charles Torkor, also identified Richard Kwame Afari, alias Wofa or Abass, as the brain behind the scan¬dal who had recruited a number of people to work for him. He described Mari as an ex-soldier and a native of Worawora who once worked as a security man at the Ministry of Information. Mr Torkor said one other suspect had been arrested and that the suspect mentioned Afari as the one who had sent him to cash money from the Stanbic Bank for a commission. The suspect, Victor Graffney, 47, who claims to be a trader, was arrested by officials of the Stanbic Bank when he went to cash GH cedis 4,500 (45 million cedis) from the accounts of the UNDP. He said the suspect had earlier cashed GH cedis 5,000 (50 million cedis) and GH cedis 5,700 (57 million cedis) within a week, as a result of which the bank's officials became suspicious and alerted the chief accountant of the UNDP who denied having signed any cheques. Mr Torkor said after Graffney's arrest, police investigations uncovered that between April 25, 2007 and May 14, 2007, the group managed to cash nine cheques, amounting to over GH cedis 170,000 (1.7 billion cedis) from a number of banks in Accra. He said the group used the same modus operandi of recruiting insiders from within the two companies to feed it with information and the signatures of persons in authority. The operations director said Mohammed Sanusi, alias Parker, the signature expert among the gang, admitted signing wills and testaments, land documents, cheques, bank statements, results slips and other important documents. He said Parker, who resides at Adabraka, told investigators that Afari only brought him blank cheques and specimen signatures so he did not know the actual amounts of money to be withdrawn. He said the suspect admitted being paid GH cedis 1,000 (10 million cedis) or GH cedis 500 (5 million cedis) for each forged signature and admitted that he signed the UNDP and Coca-Cola cheques, samples of which were found in his room. ACP Torkor said a very handsome reward awaited anybody with information that would lead to the arrest of Afari, believed to be hiding in Worawora, Accra or Kumasi. He urged members of the public with information to contact the Organised Crime Unit on the fifth floor of the CID Headquarters or call telephone numbers 020-7318115 and 027-4322289. Source: Daily Graphic