Media Statement: MCA Subang Maju Branch Vice Chairman Successfully Rescued Four(4) Trafficked Malaysian Citizens From Myanmar

MCA Subang Maju Branch Vice Chairman , Lawyer Maxine had received ‘SOS’ requests via her Facebook Page ‘LAWYER MAXINE 邱律师‘ from 4 Malaysian citizens that have allegedly been smuggled into Myanmar by syndicate to carry out ‘Scam works’ for the syndicate. Upon receiving such request, Lawyer Maxine tried her best to collect all the personal information of the four victims and other required information. Upon collecting all the required information, she immediately assisted them by first lodging police report at USJ 8 police station on 17th May 2022 and thereafter started to deal with authorities. After hard work of around a month, the four victims had successfully been saved and landed safely on Malaysian soil in the afternoon hours of 24th June 2022, which is last Friday. 

All these efforts are carried out clandestinely by Lawyer Maxine together with her team throughout the period of one month to avoid drawing unnecessary attention and it was only revealed to public after four of them successfully landed in Malaysia.

It all started off with benevolent intention when Lawyer Maxine realized that there were many youths being scammed to overseas on the promise of high salary but later found out they were cheated when they reached there. She subsequently made a video and posted on her page on 1^st May 2022 to let those alleged victims to leave comments so that she can try her best to help them.

On 9^th May 2022, she received one ‘SOS’ request from a lady who only wanted to be identified as Ms. Lim. According to the accounts of Ms. Lim, she was first taken by the syndicate from Johor Bahru with two other victims to Terengganu. Upon reaching Terengganu, another male victim joined them, and they were jointly brought to Thailand. The initial plan by the syndicate was for them to work in Thailand and Laos. One of them died due to infection of Covid-19 when in Thailand and thereafter all of them were rejected to work in Thailand and Laos.  Having no other option, Ms. Lim together with the surviving ones were later smuggled into Myanmar to work as scammers. During the course of contact between Lawyer Lawyer Maxine and Ms. Lim, Ms. Lim revealed that they were three other Malaysian victims in the same compound with her. Upon hearing that, Lawyer Maxine said she wanted to save three of them as well.

To avoid any further media coverage that would expose the victims’ identities publicly, Lawyer Maxine did not arrange reporters at the airport to interview the victims and she had only invited them for a dinner on 25^th June 2022 to listen and to further understand their terrible experiences during the course of few months when being forced to work as scammers in Myanmar.

According to 4 of them, all the victims are in the range of 28 to 42 years old and all of them are being cheated by the social media’s advertisement posted by the syndicate that promising high salary. Upon reaching the destination, they only realized what they needed to do was online scamming, and the scamming targets are of Overseas Chinese, Europeans and Americans and they would be assigned into respective groups where one group will be led by a leader to monitor their works. The salary was not as high as promised by the syndicate as shown on the website, and if they fail to achieve scamming target, they would be punished. If anyone tried to escape, the person would also be punished. Punishment would be in the likes of terribly beaten up and handcuffed to be exposed to sun lights for an entire day. Therefore after witnessing what had happened, four of them did not dare to escape.

The working hour is a continuous 14 hours and leave is only one day per month. There are entertainment facility and mini market in the compound but these are paid facilities. They would need buy their articles for daily use and toiletries from the mini market using their hard-earned salaries.  

According to another account of one male victim, he and his friends were first arranged by smugglers to Bangkok, Thailand, thereafter they were driven up to border of Thailand and Myanmar, and they were then smuggled into Myanmar by boats. When they realized something was amiss, it was already too late. They were smuggled into a compound in Myanmar to work and that compound is very big which can accommodate hundreds of people. Thereafter the Chinese Scam Leader, a China citizen, will assign them to stay in a room which can accommodate 10 persons and there are many such rooms at there. Each of them would then be given ‘food money’ for an equivalent amount of RM 1250 for them to buy food, and their handphones would be confiscated by the syndicate.  The aforementioned Ms Lim was very fortunate that she managed to grab her phone and contacted Lawyer Maxine to seek for help.

According to them, the modus operandi of the syndicate was to first fishing for targets online, and cheated them using well-orchestrated scripts. Four of them felt terrible with the arrangement and did not have the heart to keep doing this scamming works and thereafter contacting Lawyer Maxine for help. With the assistance from Lawyer Maxine and with the co-operation of Myanmar authorities, they finally returned safely to Malaysia and had also agreed to join MCA as they feel that MCA is a party who can serve the rakyat.

As a conclusion, Lawyer Maxine would also like to express her gratitude to the assistance of all quarters, including Malaysian embassy in Myanmar and Interpol in helping four of them to safely return to Malaysia.

MCA Subang Maju Branch Secretariat

26/6/2022