Image above clipped from The Star

THE public needs to be careful of handphone calls from so-called ‘authority figures’ asking for money to avoid arrest of individuals.

The caller’s ID would show a number spoofing the area’s police station.

Penang Crime Prevention and Community Safety Department head Senior Asst Comm Datuk Mohamad Anil Shah (pic) urged the people not to entertain such calls.

“The caller would claim to be from the police station and would be coming to make an arrest.

“However, if you are able to bank in before a certain time, then all charges would be dropped,” he said in his opening speech during the Jelutong Community Outreach Programme 2018 at the Batu Lanchang market recently.

He added that no police personnel or any government agencies would ever call to announce an impending arrest.

“That is not our protocol.”

He also urged the people to download the Volunteer Smartphone Patrol apps in their smartphone as part of an initiative to promote community-oriented policing.

The outreach programme was organised by the Malaysia Crime Prevention Foundation Penang. Several booths on the drug menace, health screening and gangsterism were featured.

Also present were Jelutong MP R.S.N. Rayer, Batu Lanchang assemblyman Ong Ah Teong, Penang Island City Council mayor Datuk Yew Tung Seang and the foundation Penang chairman Datuk Seri Syed Jaafar Syed Ali.

This article first appeared on The Star, reported by Intan Amalina Mohd.