A ‘Maid’ Was Just Arrested For Scamming Dozens Of People Out Of Their Rent Money
A Maltese maid has been arrested for scamming several tenants into placing deposits and paying the first month of rent on her client’s apartment in San Gwann.
Maksimilijan Kazakov, a Croatian working in Malta, told Lovin Malta he had been searching for a place to rent on a Facebook group and found a two-bedroom apartment for €750 a month.
Kazakov paid Micallef the €750 deposit, and Micallef told him to wait two days for the girls to move out. When Friday came, Micallef called him again to tell him to wait until Monday to give the girls more time to move out.
On Monday, Micallef went to Kazakov’s house, they signed the contract, she issued a cheque and Kazakov paid her a further €750 for the first month of rent. However, she told him she will give him the keys the following day because workers were carrying out maintenance on the apartment.
Yesterday, Micallef called Kazakov again to tell him to wait another day because the works were still ongoing. Kazakov this time demanded she give him the keys but Micallef said she had left them at the workers.
Kazakov smelled a rat and demanded she either give him the keys or his money back and when she refused, he reported her to the police and published a post of his experience on a Facebook group for Serbian and Macedonians in Malta. Several people instantly commented on the post to say Micallef had carried out the same scam on them.
Later that night, Micallef visited Kazakov’s house in tears, begging him to help her and to not report her to the police and promising to return his money back to him. Kazakov told her to write up a declaration saying she was not the owner of the house which he would then take to the police if she did not pay him back.
“By this time, several people had already contacted me and I suspected she planned to repay me with money she’d have got from scamming someone else,” he said.
The police arrested Micallef today and, after speaking to the house’s owners, told Kazakov she was actually their maid.
As of the time of writing, over 40 tenants had contacted Kazakov to tell him they had been scammed by the same person too – with the latest case going back to three months ago.
“On 22 July I arrived in Malta and rented an apartment in San Gwann, but was cheated,” one man told Kazakov via Messenger. “I was not given a room in San Gwann (for which I paid) but another room in Attard. After a month, I left this apartment and moved elsewhere. Alexia Micallef, who rented me the apartment, does not want to give me back my deposit.”
Another man told him Micallef had scammed his girlfriend and her friend.
“We spoke with someone who knows her ex-husband and apparently she is absolutely crazy! It is very unlikely any of us will get our money back from her.”
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