78-Year-Old Woman Loses RM307,000 Life Savings In One Day, She Doesn't Remember Most Of It

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A 78-year-old woman from Labis in Segamat, Johor, lost her entire life savings — including money set aside for her family’s ancestral grave.

Two men approached her at a wet market, told her she had won a lucky draw, and needed to collect it.

They drove her across state lines to three banks where she withdrew her life savings in cash.

She remembers almost none of it.

The victim, who sold fruit and tofu for over 40 years before retiring six years ago, was approached near her home early in the morning on 3 April.

He claimed to know her, saying she had once run a stall in Labis — a detail plausible enough that she did not question it.

CCTV Filled In What She Couldn’t Remember

On the way home to retrieve her documents, she ran into a neighbour and even invited her along.

The man stopped it, telling the neighbour she was “under 70 and not eligible.”

What followed, the victim largely cannot account for.

CCTV footage later reconstructed the sequence: the man accompanied her home, retrieved her bank documents, and put her in a car.

A second man, described as darker-skinned and in his mid 30s, was driving, while the victim sat in the front seat and the younger man sat behind her.

Both smoked continuously throughout the journey, which made the victim dizzy and unwell, and once they left Labis, she says, she lost track of where she was.

A Whisper In The Ear, And Three Banks In Two Hours

Between 11.25 am and roughly 1.30 pm, the two men took her to three banks — in Rembau and Senawang in Negeri Sembilan.

At each stop, the younger man accompanied her inside but kept his distance during transactions to avoid drawing attention to himself.

At the first bank in Rembau, she converted four fixed deposits — totalling RM237,171 — into cash within minutes, withdrawing RM210,000.

At the second bank next door, she converted another RM59,500 from fixed deposits but could only withdraw RM30,000 due to transaction limits.

At a third bank in Senawang, she transferred RM66,000 and withdrew RM60,000 despite a teller’s attempts to delay the transaction and suggest a cheque instead.

The teller’s suspicion was not unfounded; at one of the banks, staff noticed a man whispering repeatedly in the victim’s ear and questioned her for over ten minutes.

She gave inconsistent answers — at one point saying the man was her grandson, at another requesting cash for “renovation” despite not speaking English — but grew impatient, and the teller did not escalate further.

Two Pats On The Back, And They Were Gone

Her son, back from Singapore that morning, called repeatedly.

When she finally answered at 1.30 pm, she said she was having tea with friends.

The men drove her to a bank in Tangkak, Johor, gave her two hard pats on the back, and left with her handbag, which contained RM7,000 set aside for ancestral grave maintenance the following day.

At around 3 pm — still inside the bank — she called her son to say she had been scammed.

She remained disoriented until a security guard found her near closing time.

In Tears, She Asked How She Could Have Been So Foolish

At a press conference on Thursday (9 April), the victim broke down, covering her face as she wept.

She said she could not understand how she had been so foolish.

Her children and Bekok assemblyman Tan Chong were present.

Tan, who is also Deputy Chairman of the MCA Labis Division, called on banks to strengthen checks on elderly customers making large withdrawals — particularly those from out of town — and to add next-of-kin contact numbers to accounts to allow verification before transactions are processed.

He noted that the pattern of the withdrawals, coming just one day after the deposits were renewed, should have triggered intervention.

The family has lodged a police report.

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