Police have arrested a nun on fraud charges for allegedly luring 3,500 people to invest in a false cloud storage rental business, causing over 1.3 billion baht in damages.
Pol Maj Gen Teeradej Thumsutee, commander of the Police Cyber Taskforce, yesterday identified the suspect as Pattana Duangchana, 69.
She was arrested at the Nasoka Vipassana Thitthammo meditation centre in Nakhon Ratchasima’s Pak Chong district on Saturday, he said.
He said police obtained an arrest warrant in May last year following an investigation by the Investigation Division of the Metropolitan Police Bureau (IDMB).
A total of 3,531 people filed complaints with the Department of Special Investigation in 2019, he said, adding 2,878 gave statements to the DSI.
The complainants said they were duped by Concept Series Company Limited after investing in a cloud storage business, he said. The company allegedly offered an annual return of 200%, much higher than that of ordinary financial institutions. The company, however, was not able to disburse returns, causing 1.3 billion baht in damages.
The DSI found that about 600,000 transactions were linked to the scheme, with about 20–30 companies receiving investors’ money.
Concept Series opened in 2010 with 1 million baht in registered capital. Ms Pattana is one of three shareholders and also the mother of Supasan Duangchana, the company’s founder and director who was arrested in April. At the time, Ms Pattana was still at large.
Pol Maj Gen Teeradej said the IDMB obtained information that the woman had been ordained as a Buddhist nun. This information ultimately led to her arrest.
Ms Pattana rejected the charges, claiming that after retiring from teaching, her son placed her in an executive position in the company and transferred some of the company’s shares under her name but she was never involved in his business.
Police suspect that Ms Pattana became a nun after thinking it could help her escape the arrest warrant. She was sent to the Mae Tha police station in Lampang for legal action.