A Free State woman has been charged with defrauding a local municipality by impersonating a service provider.
Mantsopa Local Municipality under the Thabo Mofutsanyane District in the Free State was defrauded over R200,000 allegedly by the bogus service provider.
Maria Louisa Venter appeared in the Ladybrand magistrate’s court facing charges of fraud, forgery, uttering, and money laundering.
Remanded in jail
She has been remanded in custody and is due to appear in court on February 23 for a formal bail application.
Venter allegedly posed as Project Pioneer Construction, a service provider under the municipality. She allegedly sent an email demanding the exact amount owed to the legitimate service provider.
Impersonated legitimate service provider
Her fraudulent transaction was later discovered by the municipality. The matter was reported to the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (Hawks) Serious Commercial Crime Investigation.
Free State Hawks spokesperson Christopher Singo confirmed that the investigations led to the suspect. However, she was hard to find and her details were circulated as a wanted suspect after a warrant of arrest was issued against her.
Venter was eventually located in Pretoria and was arrested by the South African detective services in Pretoria North on Wednesday.
She was then handed over to the Hawks for her court appearance.
Legitimate service provider raised alarm
Singo explained that the incident happened in December 2020. He said the electronic email from the suspect clearly indicated the R225 289.69 on the fraudulent invoice, This was a well-known outstanding balance in the municipality.
“The budget manager knew that there was indeed an outstanding amount of money to be paid to the service provider. He requested permission from the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) to make the payment. The permission was granted. And the money [was] transferred to a bank account provided by the bogus service provider,” said Singo.
“A few days later, the legitimate service provider approached the municipality and requested the outstanding payment. The budget manager then sent proof of payment to the service provider.”
Singo said the service provider noticed that the money was indeed sent. However, the account details the money was transferred into did not belong to the service provider.
The municipality confirmed to the Hawks that the money was sent to the bogus service provider.
