Reunion: Daughter of alleged romance scam fixer ‘Linky’ arrested by Hawks, joins mom at Sun City
Mmakgomo Doris Ngcobo has appeared in court facing charges of fraud, relating to assisting scammers defraud multiple South African women. Her daughter has now been arrested by Hawks.
Image: Supplied
The daughter of alleged romance-scam fixer Mmakgomo Doris “Linky” Ngcobo has been arrested on charges of fraud and money laundering and is being held at the Johannesburg Correctional Centre, known as “Sun City”, IOL has learnt.
The daughter, who cannot be named until she appears in court, has spent the weekend at the infamous Joburg prison, pending her court appearance.
The mother was arrested last year, after being accused by several South African women of being a central figure in the romance scams where the victims lost millions of rand. Ngcobo is accused of orchestrating the elaborate scam networks and also appearing during the scams as a "personal banker" to the fraudsters.
Mmakgomo Doris Ngcobo , also known as Lebo or Linky.
Image: Hawks
Ngcobo was arrested last year by the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation, also known as the Hawks, after she had been on the wanted list for a few years. She was cornered and arrested in connection with the romance scams where three women lost amounts of R650,000, R250,000, and R1 million in three separate cases. She also faces additional cases.
In November 2024, IOL reported that a Soweto-based father of six children also insists that Ngcobo was also central to the scam where he lost R1 million to scammers.
At the time, Gauteng spokesperson for the Hawks, Lieutenant Colonel Lloyd Ramovha told IOL that Ngobo, who is known to victims of scams only as Lebo or Linky, and her co-accused, two Ugandan nationals, Derrick Nsubuga, and Nassazi Joan, were remanded in custody.
Some of the women were put through the so-called ancestral rituals, where they were hypnotised and they were led to withdraw huge sums of money.
According to sources familiar with the investigation, Ngcobo's youthful daughter was taken into custody during an operation linked to the same alleged syndicate. By Monday morning, she had not yet appeared in court.
The Hawks have not yet officially confirmed the arrest.
Investigators in the Hawks 419 scams unit have been pursuing additional suspects believed to have assisted in targeting victims through dating platforms and physical meetings, and manipulating them into taking out loans or handing over large sums of money under the guise of rituals intended to “cleanse ancestral wealth”.
IOL has published stories of several known victims who were left heavily indebted, with some blacklisted by commercial banks after losing millions of hard-earned money and loans.
This is a developing story and will be updated once the Hawks release further information or the daughter makes her first court appearance.
jonisayi.maromo@iol.co.za
IOL News