PETALING JAYA, Jan 22 — Police are believed to be closing in on the sexual predator involved in a well-planned sex shame blackmail whose victims include a 65-year-old grandmother.

His arrest will come as a big relief to his more than 200 victims.

The victims include teachers, doctors, a policewoman, a lecturer, foreign maids and single mothers, who did nothing wrong beyond letting their sexual desires short circuit common sense.

They were trapped for months by the brazen predator whose pursuit for short-term sexual encounters wove a web of extortion and blackmail.

His victims also involved an unknown number of men.

With sexually-explicit pictures and secret sex videos of his victims, the 53-year-old man raked in more than RM300,000 with just seven victims.

“We have some leads on the suspect, who is believed to be in Kota Kinabalu where he is residing with his fifth wife whom he married on December 22,” a police source told Malay Mail. 

His 15-year crime spree came to light when seven of the victims sought the help of crime activist Kuan Chee Heng, who convinced two of the women to lodge police reports.

Police then unlocked the secrets of the career conman, who started his journey of lies in 2000, with the help of one of the victims.

The victim, who declined to be identified, conducted her own investigations and found phone numbers of hundreds of his other victims stored in his mobile phone.

“She also found hotel receipts and messages on Facebook and other social networking sites that the suspect used to befriend his victims,” said the police source.

The women told police the man preyed on their emotions by sending them pictures accompanied by child-like text messages.

She also claimed the suspect told her that he previously worked as a gigolo and was now a changed man.

Kuan said the suspect lied to his victims about various jobs that he held, including as a freelance trainer, tour guide and marriage counsellor to dupe them to meet him.

“He spends just three weeks to cheat a victim before he moves on to his next target. He managed to cheat a grandmother when he randomly met her in a bus,” he said.

“He met the poor granny in the bus in Penang, who confessed to him that she had some problems with securing a legal tender. He claimed he had some contacts that could help and eventually conned her.

“He also had sex with her and played the sympathy card. He managed to make off with gold jewellery worth RM12,000.”

Kuan said the suspect would take sex videos or nude pictures of the victims to blackmail them for their hard-earned cash.

In order to get the victims to chat with him, he would send them a picture of himself looking sick in hopes of gaining their sympathy.

Some of the victims also told police that they believe the suspect had cast a spell on them and that was the reason why they were easily manipulated by him.

“All of his wives will support him until they find out about his wrongdoings. They will then leave him. This leads him to find another wife as replacement,” he added.