The Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions has filed amended charges in the case of a pair of Cyprus brothers facing money laundering charges.

Cyprus nationals Loizos Petridis, 42, and Cleanthis Petridis, 46, face charges involving the withdrawal of money from automated teller machines (ATMs) in Suva.

The two brothers, represented by lawyer Filimoni Vosarogo, appeared before Judge Justice Thushara Rajasinghe on Thursday. They are now charged with two counts of money laundering, one count each of attempt to obtain property by deception and possession of property suspected of being proceeds of crime.

The matter was adjourned for a plea to be taken on the amended charges on July 5. Both the accused were remanded in custody pending trial.

The charges:

For the offence of money laundering, the first count alleged that the brothers between December 12 and December 19, 2017, at Suva, engaged directly in transactions involving $26,890 by using BSP ATM machines to withdraw funds that were the proceeds of crime, as they were obtained using fraudulent credit cards and stole personal financial information knowing or ought to have reasonably known that the money is derived from some form of unlawful activity, that is the accounts of individuals residing in jurisdictions other than Fiji, and whose credit card information was stolen.

The second count of money laundering alleged that the brothers between December 12 and December 19, 2017, at Suva engaged directly in transactions involving $8000 by using BSP ATM machines to withdraw funds and sent the withdrawn funds overseas, that were the proceeds of crime, which were obtained using fraudulent credit cards and stolen personal financial information, knowing or ought to have reasonably known that the money is derived from some form of unlawful activity, that is the accounts of individuals residing in jurisdictions other than Fiji, and whose credit card information was stolen.

For the charge of attempt to obtain property by deception, the brothers are alleged that between December 12 and December 19, 2017, at Suva, by deception attempted to dishonestly obtain $103,770, from Bank of South Pacific, with the intention of permanently depriving the bank of the said amount.

For the charge of possession of property suspected of being proceeds of crime, the brothers are alleged that between December 12 and December 19, 2017, at Suva, possessed $203,011 that may reasonably be suspected of being proceeds of crime.

Edited by Jonathan Bryce

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