RIGHT after this newspaper’s story in Wednesday’s issue about the Trinidadian conman who was targeting individuals with promises of visas, another male contacted us wailing about being outsmarted by the very fellow.

Late last evening, Ryan Sooklall, a vendor at the Bourda Market contacted this publication with claims that the crook who calls himself Daniel Ali had tricked him of $30,000 with claims that he was going to sell him a brand new S6 I Phone he had in his possession.
The vendor lamented that he bumped into the conman on the adam4adam social network and struck up a conversation. He said telephone numbers were exchanged and subsequently the two met a few days later.
Sooklall said on the second meeting Ali offered to sell him an almost brand new S6 IPhone he had in his possession but he balked at the enormous charge the man was demanding. He said as he was about to turn down the offer, Ali told him that he can “pay in pieces” and would collect the phone when the entire payment of $80,000 was made.
The vendor said he took $30,000 of his hard earned money and gave it to the Trinidadian who promised that he would hand over the phone as soon as two other payments of $25, 000 were made. He said when he managed to acquire the next installment and was ready to pay up, he was unable to get the crook on the telephone number he had provided.
When designer Alex Lawson who the conman robbed of $30,000 posted his photo (taken from a passport) on Facebook, Sooklall said he almost went into a coma since the photo fitted the description of the very man who had outsmarted him of his hard earned dollars.
Meanwhile, Lawson has informed that the conman seems to be working with another accomplice who mysteriously began contacting him on Facebook before he handed over the $30,000 which was a down payment for the conman to arrange accommodation for the designer in Trinidad.
Meanwhile, the confidence trickster has also managed to con fashion designer Olympia Small-Sonoram a whopping $75,000 after he promised to leave his passport and other documents as surety for a loan to ‘get himself back together’.
Sonoram had said that the man pretended to be recoiling from a ruptured relationship with his male lover, and had wanted the money to find new accommodation. She recalled that when he arrived with the bag containing the purported documents she was dealing with a client and therefore had not checked the contents until the con artist had left her premises. She almost died when she discovered the bag only contained scrap paper, lipstick and face powder.
Daniel Ali, as he calls himself, has so far managed to rob several businessmen at Uitvlugt where he was operating a fast food outlet and disappeared after it was discovered that he and accomplice Steven Baboolall were actually renting cars from dealers which they later sold to unsuspecting buyers.
While Baboolall was arrested and taken into police custody, he never returned to the Lenora Police Station after he was released on bail despite being instructed to do so by the ranks.
Reports reaching this publication suggest that while Baboolall may be hiding out at relatives in Black Bush Polder, the Trinidadian crook continues to evade the police.

(By Alex Wayne)