M'sians jailed for electronic card forgery

However they would serve only 50 years behind bar under the Thai criminal code’s maximum penalty. 

The five defendants – Francis Xavier Arulappan, 35, Mageswaran Balakrishnan, 23, VelanraJ Vallanrasen, 22, Gunalan Kumaresan, 25, and Kartik Sinansamy, 25 – were found guilty of 142 counts of electronic card forgery and using of the fake cards to withdraw cash worth Bt500,000. The lawsuit stated that the five men and other elusive accomplices from April 2-26, 2009 had used some 700 fake electronic cards to buy goods and withdraw cash from banks in Krabi, Trang, Songkhla and other provinces on 142 occasions.

 The court found them guilty and initially sentenced each of them to a 568 years in prison but halved the punishment to 284 years on grounds of useful confession. The court also ordered them to repay Bt500,000 to the damaged banks.