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Published on January 13, 2008

Among the 400 businesses whose practices are suspected to be pyramid schemes, most voluntarily close down by notifying police about their activities and get away with large amounts of money while serving light sentences or paying "affordable fines".

Those who run these businesses choose to pre-empt police action against them by hiring some willing employees to serve prison terms for them or by paying heavy fines - amounts they can afford to lose - so that they can disappear with the cash.

According to the Department of Special Investigation (DSI), while most of these people try this type of unlawful hit-and-run businesses just once, or wait to try again after the end of the statute of limitations, there are many who plan a new business scheme soon after the end of their previous operation.

Economic and Cyber Crimes Division (Ecotec) chief Pol Maj-General Wisut Wanichbutr said these companies had planned to do hit-and-run businesses from the start. They also hired "fall guys" who would be sacrificed in return for a huge pay-out, which they could enjoy after serving a light jail sentence.

In many cases, the officer said innocent scheme members, already aware they were involved in an illegal business, did nothing to stop the schemes but chose to receive the dividends at least equal to the amount of money they had invested.

These people finally quit after they received what they wanted, leaving other scheme members to suffer when the schemes collapsed or when police took action against their business.

Fewer scheme members would suffer if the police acted faster once wrongdoings were detected, Wisut said.

Such pyramid-scheme owners have chosen to pre-empt police action because in the event of the police initiating action, they would be caught and required to repay the money to the investors. Police had not admitted to this common practice before, he added.

DSI spokesman Piyawat Kingket, said there were now around 400 suspicious pyramid schemes being run with objectives and procedures different from what had been originally declared.

In the case of Easy Network Marketing, which ran the original rice seed scheme, he said the company had opened more than 1,000 accounts with various commercial banks in all 76 provinces.

These banks' headquarters could initially do nothing about the random but frequent money transactions even after they had detected irregularities.

Piyawat, also the head of the DSI's Special Crimes Division, said swift action and concerted effort by authorities was needed to halt these schemes before the money went missing, or many more people would suffer.

He added the main objective of the DSI-led joint operations was to get as much money as possible back to the innocent investors.

Anan Paengnoy

The Nation