SEVENTEEN persons, believed to be involved in the lotto scam,  were taken into custody, following simultaneous operations conducted against scammers by a team the security forces, yesterday.

The operations which started at approximately 3:30 am yesterday and ended in the afternoon were conducted in six parishes – Trelawny, St. James, Hanover, Westmoreland, St. Elizabeth and Manchester led by the Area 1 Police and which included members of the Organised Crime Investigation Division (OCID), the Mobile Reserve, the Jamaica Defence Force (JDF) and the Financial Investigation Division (FID).

The 17 persons taken into custody will be processed and interviewed.

In addition, several high-end Sports Utility Vehicles (SUVS) and a large quantity of documents were seized in the various operations. The SUVs seized included the Infiniti, Lexus and Honda CRV models. One of the SUVs was seized at a car mart where it is alleged that vehicles owned by scammers were being sold.

The documents seized will be processed by the FID.