Police has arrested two men on allegations of creating a fake facebook account in the names of the Vice President, Edward Kiwanuka Ssekandi and fleeced the public of millions of shillings.
The two men identified as Iddi Bategeka and Mark Mutebi were arrested from Mpasan in Kukumiro District by detectives from CID.
“The duo has been arrested after a vigorous investigation conducted by our detectives, following a spurious post on a pseudo-Facebook account that was created in the names of Vice president of the republic of Uganda, Edward Kiwanuka Ssekandi,” said the CID spokesperson, Charles Twine.
These, he said would use the account to solicit for money from unsuspecting members of the public after promising to recruit them in the UPDF and other government ministries, departments and agencies.
“Our detectives have been able to retrieve electronic gadgets from the suspects that are of evidential value including their phone sets and simcards.
He however warned anyone who would wish to engage in such criminality will face the wrath of the law because they have a “highly proficient” team with skills to counter those fraudsters.
“We thank the members of public and the media for being a great infrastructure upon which we drive our successful investigations.”
He said the suspects who are currently being interrogated at CID headquarters in Kibuli will be charged with impersonation contrary to section 381 of the Penal Code Act, electronic fraud contrary to section 19 of the Computer Misuse Act and obtaining money by false pretence contrary to section 305 of the Penal Code Act.
Cases of fraud using social media accounts, especially facebook have been on the rise in the past few years and have seen a number of people falling prey to the fraudsters.
Many accounts have been created in names of media houses, government officials, businessmen, ministries, agencies and high profile individuals to defraud the public.
Police has always warned the public against falling prey to these fraudsters but many have ended up losing their hard-earned money to them.
