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Quick-thinking Tokyo hospital employee foils fraud plot

Hajime Matsuda
Hajime Matsuda
TOKYO (TR) – Tokyo Metropolitan Police have arrested a 27-year-old man after a hospital employee sensed he was about to swindle an elderly woman, reports TBS News (Oct. 25).

On Monday, police arrested Hajime Matsuda for allegedly attempting to defraud the woman, an 83-year-old resident of Katsushika Ward, out of her bank cards.

“For part-time work, I got an offer from a person I don’t know to pick up the cards,” police quoted the suspect, who has been accused of attempted fraud.

According to police, the woman had been told on the telephone by a person posing as an employee from the Japan Banker’s Association that her bank cards were being abused by a third party.

That same day, the woman was scheduled to have an examination at a hospital. When she telephoned the hospital to cancel the appointment, she explained to an employee that she was meeting a person from the association to return her cards. The hospital employee then alerted police who arrested Matsuda.

Police believe that Matsuda is a subordinate member of a fraud ring that repeatedly targets elderly persons in similar scams.