Shropshire arrests over bank scam

Four men and two women, aged between 18 and 32, from the county were arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to defraud and money laundering.

The arrests took place in Shrewsbury and Telford. Another two people, a 25-year-old woman from Staffordshire, and an 18-year-old man from Leicestershire, were also arrested in a joint operation between the Met's Police Central e-crime Unit, the Serious Organised Crime Agency and West Mercia Police on Friday.

An 18-year-old man, a 32-year-old woman, a 28-year-old man and a 19-year-old woman, all from Telford were arrested on Friday and later a man in his early 20s, also from Telford, handed himself into police and was also arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to defraud and money laundering.

A 20-year-old man from Shrewsbury was also among the suspects arrested.

The Metropolitan Police said all eight of those arrested had now been released on police bail.

The arrests come as part of an investigation after reports that more than 2,000 phishing pages had been placed on the internet. The pages mimicked genuine banking websites and were designed to dupe people into logging on to the fake sites and provide their bank details.

A large number of these accounts were subsequently illegally accessed and money extracted, a Metropolitan Police spokesman said.

Three men, Godday Sunday Etu, 26, of Islington Gates, Fleet Street, Birmingham, Inout Caraman, 22 and Adrian Iorgovean, 27, both from Adamcl, Romania, appeared at Westminster Magistrates Court last month, charged with conspiracy to defraud UK banks and money laundering.

Etu is also accused of further money laundering offences and possession of false identity card documents.

They were remanded in custody to appear at Inner London Crown Court on January 11.

By Chris Burn