By Diarmaid Doherty
A breakdown of the statistics on romance fraud, accommodation fraud and credit card scams in Donegal are to be made available by senior Gardaí.
It comes as concern has been expressed over the fact that many people decide not to report such crimes, mainly out of embarrassment.
It’s thought the number of people living in Donegal being scammed in organised fraud crime is on the increase and some individuals have lost thousands of euro after being targeted by fraudsters.
Donegal Deputy Pearse Doherty attended the recent Donegal County Joint Policing Committee meeting in Lifford where Gardaí gave the usual round-up of crime figures for Donegal.
The statistics, however, don’t include figures for fraud crime.
The Sinn Féin deputy insisted that with fraud on the increase, it should be included in the crime statistics at JPC meetings.
“Fraud is a massive issue across the State,” Deputy Doherty said.
“We have thousands of people being scammed every single year. They are in Donegal as much as other areas.”
He added: “There’s accommodation fraud, romance fraud, people have lost tens of thousands of euro. I would encourage that this should be a part of the statistics here.
“It is a growing area and there is a large amount of people that don’t report fraud. That’s the issue here.
“The question is, is any of this ever detected? Have there been cases of accommodation fraud, romance fraud, investment fraud here in Donegal? Have we investigated and have there been detections and prosecutions?”
In response, Chief Superintendent Aidan Glackin agreed that online fraud has been on the increase, especially since Covid.
“We have all seen an increase in either phishing or mishing or money muling,” he said.
“Donegal is no different than any other county.”
He said Gardaí have a dedicated team who work on investigating those crimes in Donegal and it’s a busy unit.
He added that he would be happy to include figures for incidents of fraud in his crime statistics at the next meeting.
The chairman of the committee, Cllr. Gerry McMonagle pointed out that the JPC often debated fraud crime and in the past had received presentations and advice from Garda fraud investigators.
An awareness campaign had also been organised on cyber crime which had been very successful, he said.
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