Waikato police have arrested two men as a result of a long-running fraud inquiry, and say more arrests will follow.
Operation Allsorts was launched in late 2002, and early on in the inquiry police arrested Leslie Orchard, who pleaded guilty to 686 fraud-related charges.
Two Hamilton men aged 46 and 43 have
been arrested and were to appear in Hamilton District Court today facing more than 100 charges between them, Detective Senior Sergeant Mike Whitehead said in a statement.
"Operation Allsorts has focused on a group of people that the police allege are an organised criminal enterprise involved in fraudulent activities to obtain loans from financial institutions," Mr Whitehead said.
"It is alleged that the money from the loans has been 'laundered' in a number of ways, leaving either the financial institutions or innocent property owners with substantial losses."
The amount of money concerned had not been finalised and was still growing as new offences were identified.
- NZPA
