Some of the 25 Japanese men arrested for allegedly taking part in phone scams from Phnom Penh targeting people across Japan have complained about harsh treatment by those who led the scam operation in the Cambodian capital, police said Thursday.
One of them told Japanese police after their arrests Wednesday while being deported from Cambodia aboard a flight bound for Japan that he had only one day off a month and was “not allowed to go outside” the apartment from which the scam was run.
“I wanted to stay only for two to three months but could not return home (as he wanted). Honestly I am relieved that I was arrested,” the police quoted another as saying.
The second person said he’d had to share a room with another participant and that the food they were given “did not taste good,” according to the police.
The 25 suspects, who range in age from 20 to 42, entered Cambodia between March and August this year and swindled at least around ¥236 million ($1.6 million) through the scam calls, they said.
Cambodian authorities raided the apartment in September, detaining the 25 and confiscating devices, including dozens of mobile phones and computers.
The allegations against the 25 include calling a woman in her 70s in Hokkaido around August, claiming she had won the right to move into a nursing home, and then defrauding her of ¥450,000 in cash, according to investigative sources.
She was also duped out of ¥50,000 in electronic money under the pretense of resolving a dispute regarding her transfer, they said.