JEDDAH, 12 June 2007 — Police arrested yesterday two African con men who duped a Saudi businessman of SR700,000 by promising to provide him with SR5 million worth of “grade A” counterfeit American dollars in exchange.

Police said that two Sudanese employees, who had been working for the Saudi businessman for a long time, offered to help the man win back losses he recently suffered in the Saudi stock market. The Sudanese men said they would introduce him to people who could provide him with SR5 million worth of US dollars in exchange for SR700,000.

The businessman said he trusted the two men as they had been working for him for a long time.

The Sudanese men in turn called a Ghanaian national, who met the businessman and using black paper and some liquid pretended to change the paper into a $1,000 bill.

Police said that the Ghanaian man used sleight of hand to produce an original $1,000 bill, saying it was a perfect counterfeit copy.

Convinced, the Saudi man gave the Ghanaian SR700,000, who introduced him to a Nigerian man called Jibreen, also known as Hobab. According to police, Hobab was the leader of the gang. Police said that after the money was handed over, the two Sudanese employees fled the country.

However, the Ghanaian and Nigerian nationals decided to further dupe the Saudi businessman and asked him to provide them with an additional SR40,000 to buy a liquid substance, which they said was needed to make more counterfeit bills.

At this point, the businessman realized that he had been duped and reported the incident to police, who arrested the two African nationals.

Madinah Con Man Held

Meanwhile, the Madinah branch of the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice arrested an African con man in the Al-Harra Al-Shargeya district of the city.

The arrests follow tip offs about the activities of the man, who would say that he could double people’s money with the help of a genie in return for a small fee.

A number of naive people had fallen victim to the man’s scam and reported him to the authorities. The man would keep changing his location to avoid capture. Following a tip off, commission members were able to arrest the man red-handed after an undercover commission member handed him SR3,000 to be turned into SR21 million.

The con man has been handed over to the police for further questioning and will appear in front of a Saudi court.