MONTEGO BAY, St James – Cops from seven arms of the police force yesterday raided 13 locations in Hanover and St James, arresting more than 30 persons, six of whom are believed to be key players in a multi-million dollar international sweepstakes and lottery scam that has been blamed for a significant number of the more than 200 murders committed in St James over the last 14 months.

But one policeman, who was a target of the raids, managed to elude the early morning dragnet, Inspector Steve Brown, the communications officer for Operation Kingfish, told journalists.

Brown said that the six persons believed to be key players in the deadly scam will be transferred to Kingston for further questioning today.

The raids, which began at about 5:30 am, were carried out in Lethe, Hanover; Westgate Hills, Harbour Street, Bogue Village and Granville, all in St James, Brown said.

Cops from Operation Kingfish, the Fraud Squad, Financial Investigation Division, Special Anti-Crime Task Force, Mobile Reserve, Organised Crime Division, and Area One, assisted by Jamaica Defence Force soldiers, participated in the operation.

Nine motor vehicles, over $1 million in cash, a number of computers, cellular phones, and what Brown described as “interesting documents that will lead us very far in the investigations” were seized.

“We are convinced that we have hit it (the scam) very hard and have made a major dent in this illegal activity going on in Montego Bay, which is responsible for a number of murders and a number of other crimes committed in Montego Bay,” Inspector Brown said at a press briefing at the Freeport Police Station in Montego Bay.

Up to late yesterday, the identities of those taken into custody were not released by the police, but Brown remained confident they will be charged by the end of this week.

“We don’t want to name the major players,” he said. “We are just doing the preliminary investigations now and we will release them (names) later. Interestingly, a number of women have been caught in this dragnet and we are told that some of them are the real collectors.”

Police say the tricksters obtain the names and addresses of telemarketing customers who purchase sweepstakes tickets online.

The racketeers then contact these customers by telephone and inform them that they have won the lottery. These persons would then be told to pay processing fees of up to US$5,000.

Brown told reporters that the notorious Stone Crusher and the Hot Stepper gangs are closely associated with racketeers.

Gangsters are contracted to “hit” members of the scam team who swindle cash that they are sent to collect at money transfer centres on behalf of key players, he said.

“This has become a danger to Montego Bay,” said Brown. “People are being killed because of their involvement. They hire the guys from the Stone Crusher to do the killing and they finance the Stone Crusher gang, so they are the ones who assist the guys to buy the high-powered weapons they are carrying.”

Up to late yesterday evening, Operation Kingfish cops were said to be conducting raids at several other locations across western Jamaica.