Two men have been charged in connection with separate fraud investigations in which police say bogus gas cards were used to fill up trucks with fuel earlier this month in Mississauga\u2019s east end.<\/p>\n
Peel Regional Police said the first incident took place on April 1 at around 4:30 p.m. when an employee of a Dixie Road\/Britannia Road East gas station reported a man was distributing fraudulent fuel cards to truck drivers.<\/p>\n
Officers quickly responded to the scene and subsequently determined the driver of a dump truck had used one of the cards to obtain more than $330 worth of diesel fuel before returning the gas card to a man.<\/p>\n
Police made an arrest a short time later.<\/p>\n
Praven Wijayanantham, 27, of Toronto, is charged with:<\/p>\n
Possession\/trafficking of credit card data.
\nPossession of an instrument for copying credit card data.<\/p>\n
Officers seized several fuel cards, multiple cellphones, a laptop and a card-scanning device, police said in a news release issued Tuesday morning.<\/p>\n
Investigators allege a man had \u201cobtained payment information from trucking companies legitimately purchasing fuel using fleet cards. The cards were then cloned and used to offer discounted fuel to independent drivers, who paid the (man) directly while the charges were billed to the victim companies.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a separate incident last Thursday, police responded to another fraud in progress just before 4:30 p.m. at a gas station in the area of Atlantic Drive and Britannia Road East.<\/p>\n
Police said a man was seen\u00a0using fraudulent fuel cards to put gas in four trucks, obtaining more than $2,233 worth of fuel.<\/p>\n
An arrest was made a short time later in that case as well.<\/p>\n
Thanisan Thanabalasingam, 28, of Brampton, is charged with:<\/p>\n
Fraud under $5,000.
\nPossession of fraudulently obtained credit card data.<\/p>\n
Police seized two fraudulent fuel cards, an unauthorized credit card and two cellphones.<\/p>\n
Both investigations are ongoing, police said.<\/p>\n
\u201cMembers of the public are asked to remain vigilant for potentially fraudulent activity, including the sale of fuel under suspicious or significantly discounted circumstances,\u201d police said. \u201cIndividuals who knowingly participate may be considered complicit and could face criminal charges.\u201d<\/p>\n
Anyone with information about either investigation is asked to call police at 905-453-2121, ext. 3335, or Peel Crime Stoppers anonymously at 1-800-222-8477.<\/p>\n
For more information about fraud, including prevention tips, police urge people to visit the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre online<\/a>.<\/p>\n