The Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) has cautioned car buyers to be wary of a new con game being run on unsuspecting Kenyans.
In a statement shared on Thursday, July 22, the agency unearthed the trick used by the conmen in which they first hire cars from agents disguising themselves as customers.
When they get hold of the vehicles, they then forge details about the car before putting them up for sale as though they were their properties.
"Forging details in the vehicles' original documents (which detectives suspect are shared by rogue car hire agents) the cons go-ahead to fake the identity of genuine car owners, making it difficult for their to-be customers to detect any discrepancies after conducting a search," read the statement in part.
Interested buyers will then make offers after which they will be expected to pay a percentage of the purchase price before taking over the ride.
"It is not until the innocent buyers demand that car logbooks be transferred into their names that they realize they were duped into illegal deals," added the statement.
In the meantime, the car hire agents will have moved to the police to report that a lease on their vehicles hired out had already run its course and the car not returned.
The report would trigger investigations that would track down the vehicles in possession of their unsuspecting new owners.
"Numerous such scenarios have in the past few days hit the DCI's social media platforms (especially from Murang'a and Kiambu counties), with victims narrating their ordeals in the hands of criminals whose sheer greed for quick money has no mercy for the victims' toil and sweat.
"Whereas the DCI is working tirelessly to shatter this trend and bring to justice players in the sham deals, members of the public are urged to beware of the con trick," cautioned DCI.
A similar incident happened to Michael Njogo Gitonga, President Uhuru Kenyatta's look-alike leading to his arrest on Wednesday, July 14, for allegedly stealing a car.
Speaking to Kenyans.co.ke, Gitonga's manager, Stephen Njenga decried the arrest claiming that his client had been falsely accused.
"Yes, he's at Jogoo Road Police Station. Police are claiming that he has allegedly stolen the car that he was found in. But he had been gifted the car last year," Njenga stated.
GItonga had been gifted a brand new Nissan Note in September 2020, by a car sales company with the event widely covered by the media.
