Two suspects, Sebasa Mogale, 52, and his wife Dorah Mogale, 44, briefly appeared before the Polokwane magistrate’s court, on Friday, March 15 2024 The couple faces charges of fraud emanating from a Bitcoin Scam.
Released on R10k bail each
They were each released on a R10 000 bail, and will appear again on May 20 2024 for further police investigation.
Reports indicated that during the year 2020, Sebasa Mogale, who was working at one of the SABC radio stations, advertised the scam called “Mining City” on Radio. In the advert, he explained how people can become rich by investing money into the Mining City packages. Investors were to get rewarded based on how much they invested, he said in the advert.
He told listeners to visit his office, number 103 present, Landros Mare Street in Polokwane. There they were to attend the session where himself and two other people will be presenting in the seminar.
Investments varied from R6,500 to R253k
People attended the session, and brochures indicating different packages were distributed to them. The attendees believed in the advertised scam, the reasons being he is Mr Sebasa Mogale, the radio presenter. They gave them reference numbers to individually deposit the money into the Standard bank account belonging to the Altcoin trader.
The alleged mining packages varied from R6,500 to R253,000, with different estimated payouts.
The victims were so convinced they started to put money in the said scam. After depositing the money, the victims were given instruction to go to the office. There they created email addresses and login details each.
Six months period for better returns
This was in order for them “to have access to their invested money”. They were told to wait for a period of six months before they withdrew their benefits. This was so that they could get “better benefits”.
Apparently, the problem started when the victims tried to withdraw their money after the “maturity period”. That’s when they realised that the details given to them were blocked.
When victims questioned Sebasa telephonically about their investment, he told them that the Mining City Scam had collapsed due to the inflation rate.
Inflation rate excuse
It meant that said investors have lost their money in the scam. Victims went back to the office. Unfortunately they found that the office was closed, and his phone was on voice mail.
Around May 2022, over 10 case dockets were registered against the suspects at Polokwane and Mokopane SAPS. More cases are expected to be opened.
Police investigations are still ongoing.
