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The case of the Auction Website

AN EAST London resident who was defrauded after making an online purchase may have stumbled onto an international racket after hiring a private detective to help him.

François Eales, a natural medicine practitioner who lives and works in Gonubie, said that last Thursday he bid to buy an Apple iPhone cellphone and a Sony Vaio laptop on a an Internet auction website.

“I’ve made over 300 purchases in the past through the site and have never had a problem before.”

Eales’ bid on the iPhone was not accepted, but his bid for the laptop was successful.

“I contacted the seller and got his details,” said Eales. “He told me he was moving to Australia.”

Eales deposited the money that afternoon into his account and arranged with his parents, who lived nearby, to collect the laptop the following day.

However, they could not get hold of the seller on the cellphone number provided.

Eales said he then turned to the internet again to find a reliable private investigator to help him trace the individual.

“I discovered the account was held in Namibia, in the name of someone else and that it had quite a substantial amount of money in it.”

Eales said police were looking into the matter.

The private detective agency, said that from preliminary investigations he suspected a larger syndicate could be at work.

“It’s possible the bank account in Namibia could be a money-laundering scheme where fraudsters deposit money and give a commission to the account owner,” he said.

Operations manager for the website, said it was unfortunate that people used the site to commit acts of fraud. He said 99 percent of the transactions on the website were legitimate

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