HEAD of the Counter-Terrorism and Organised Crime Investigation Branch (CTOC) Assistant Commissioner of Police Dr Anthony McLaughlin says the clampdown by Jamaican authorities on the use of remittance companies by scammers has seen them diverting their ill-gotten gains to Japan to purchase motor vehicles which has resulted in “a prevalence” of used car dealerships here.

“Lotto scamming activity is a perfect [example of] transnational organised crime. Prior to 2018 whenever someone was involved in lottery scamming they would use remittance services to send the money to Jamaica and they would collect or have their runners collect the proceeds,” the CTOC head told the inaugural Ministry of National Security CyberSMART Conference on Tuesday.

“What we find after that is because of the robust investigations and [our] meetings with these remittance companies, they always try to be ahead of law enforcement so what they do is have persons in the United States and other Caribbean countries remit those moneys to Japan where they buy used cars and then ship those used cars to Jamaica,” McLaughlin outlined.

The challenges faced by Jamaican law enforcement in the investigation and prosecution of “lotto scams” resulted in the enactment of the Law Reform (Fraudulent Transactions) (Special Provisions) Act 2013 which made a significant dent in the practice, causing the actors to pivot, the CTOC head said.

“So, if you look you would see a prevalence of used car dealers in Jamaica, that’s one of the reasons; I’m not saying that’s the main reason, but that’s one of the reasons, because the money cannot come to Jamaica again, it cannot come in barrels and suitcases and it cannot come through the remittance companies, so what they do is send it to Japan where they buy the vehicles and send them here and then resell those vehicles to get back their money,” he told the conference.

A check of the Jamaica Trade Board website by the Jamaica Observer revealed that as of February 12 this year there are 400 certified used car dealerships operating across the island.

Tuesday, McLaughlin said the diversionary tactic also applies to the illegal arms trade.

“The same thing goes for firearms; most of the firearms that we find on the wharves are for gangs but quite a number of them is for resale,” McLaughlin stated.

In the meantime, senior director of intelligence at the Major Organised Crime and Anti-Corruption Agency (MOCA) Lieutenant Colonel (Ret’d) Richard DaCosta, in addressing the question of what can be done to manage the risk of the nexus between transnational organised crimes and cyber crimes, said “information is the key enabler”.

“Information allows understanding, understanding allows us to resource. The resources, if properly managed, will allow us to mitigate and start to get ahead of the curve with respect to… the threat actors within the transnational organised crime space within the context of cyber-crimes. A lack of understanding is something that has prevented Jamaica from getting ahead of some of the problems,” he said.

“We can speak to lottery scamming, if I can use that example, in the very early days when we saw the very visible impacts of it — the ‘flossing’, the washing of expensive cars with Cristal Champagne and all that kind of thing. We as Jamaicans unfortunately glamourised and took heart and cheer from it because we were getting back at our oppressors. We didn’t realise until the bodies started to fall, not in the ones and twos but in the 10s and 20s and 30s, as a result of the unfortunate competition between these guys, that what we were glamorising was something that was insidious not only in respect of the people who lost their life savings, but also in relation to our own economy, our own national security economy within the context of not just small areas in Montego Bay but islandwide,” he pointed out.

“Information is critical for understanding and so we need to get ahead of that information curve and inform ourselves better so that we can inform policymakers, and policymakers can inform legislation and the enforcement of that legislation, but more importantly to resource the legitimate arms of the State that have to combat these things on a regular basis,” he said further.

McLaughlin, commenting further on the remedies, said education was the route.

“All of those inside here have a responsibility to first educate those who we have influence over — our children — and if we are able to educate them, let them know what is right from what is wrong because we are in an age now where money is what dictates why and how people do things,” the senior lawman said.

“Although we within law enforcement have been doing all we can, when we look at our resources it is not going to be easy to prevent cybercrimes, so we must inculcate in our youngsters the value of education, the value of working honestly for what they want to achieve,” he stated.