The Department of Special Investigation (DSI) is ready to join the investigation of the iCon Group e-commerce company, if the Consumer Protection Division (CPD) have sufficient grounds to believe that the firm’s direct marketing business qualifies as a Ponzi scheme.
Pol Maj Yutthana Praedam, DSI deputy director, said yesterday that, although the DSI has not yet started a probe into the iCon Group, it has been sharing information with the CPD.
He explained, however, that the DSI can immediately accept the iCon Group case for investigation if it involves offences stipulated in the Special Investigation Act. If not, the case would need to be vetted by a special panel before it can be investigated by the DSI.
If the DSI does take the case, Yutthana said it will focus its probe in the company’s financial statements and its business plan, to determine whether the company’s priority is the recruitment of new members or the sale of its products. The money trail, vis-a-vis the company’s top executives, would also be thoroughly investigated.
To date, the CPD has not pressed any charges against iCon Group’s CEO Waratphol Waratvorakul or other top executives, although more than 700 investors have filed complaints with the CPD against the company.
Meanwhile, Anti-Money Laundering Office (AMLO) secretary-general Thepsu Bawornchotdara said that it will be proposed, at its meeting this Thursday, that the Transactions Committee investigate the assets of iCon Group’s top executives.
In the case of the iCon Group, Thepsu said AMLO will look into all the business’s transactions, to determine whether the top executives were violating the law on borrowing to the extent of defrauding the public or breaching the anti-money laundering law.
Another important issue for consideration by the committee is an allegedly fraudulent gold trading case, implicating a celebrity, Kornkanok Suwanbut, in which hundreds of investors were allegedly cheated.
