30 Charged Following 10-Month Investigation
By: Louie Rosella, Mississauga News

Two Mississauga residents are among 30 people charged in connection with a violent criminal enterprise that profited from bank robberies and the production of counterfeit cash.

The suspects, some as young as 15, are facing a total of 469 charges after being arrested by a Peel Regional Police Task Force consisting of officers from the Central Robbery and Fraud bureaus.

The charges include attempted murder, aggravated assault, forcible confinement and armed robbery, along with countless fraud and counterfeiting charges, officers announced yesterday at a news conference.

Detectives believe they also can connect several of the suspects to unsolved crimes in Peel, including a home invasion in Malton back in November of 2003 and a stabbing at the Bramalea City Centre in October of 2004.

The probe started last summer when investigators believed a bank robbery at at a CIBC branch in Brampton was committed by the same group who robbed the bank earlier in the year.

During the initial stages, several people were identified as possible suspects in bank robberies and other thefts that had occurred in Peel and Toronto . Some of the suspects were believed to be involved in the laundering of counterfeit Canadian currency across Ontario .

Police say the thieves would purchase items from stores in Mississauga and other cities with the bogus cash, then return the property at a different location to "receive the value of the item back in legal tender."

Hundreds of stores were victimized across southern Ontario and Quebec , said Peel Const. Kathy Weylie.

Police then discovered counterfeit money was being printed by members of the ring. More than $4.5 million in fake cash has been linked to the ring, police said.

Between July 2005 and April 2006, a number of search warrants were executed across the GTA, resulting in the seizure of firearms, bullet proof vests, quantities of counterfeit currency, debit and credit card skimming equipment and card data.

Police also seized computers that contained, in total, more than 10,000 credit card and debit card numbers.

Twenty-year-old Akosua Dwumaah is charged with 11 fraud and counterfeiting money offences. Also, 27-year-old Noel McLean is charged with possession of drugs and breach of probation. Both men are from Mississauga .

Seven local teenagers, whose identities are protected under the Youth Criminal Justice Act, are charged with a number of offences including robbery, possession of counterfeit currency, possession of property obtained by crime, possession for the purpose of trafficking drugs.