Introduction
Urban insecurity is often associated with violent crime, armed robbery and other forms of direct physical coercion (Aduloju et al., 2020; Cheng & Chen, 2021). However, some forms of victimisation occur through less visible mechanisms involving deception, persuasion, distraction and the manipulation of everyday social interactions. These forms of confidence-based crime present a particular security challenge because potential victims may not immediately recognise that a criminal encounter is taking place (Lee, 2023). As a result, the problem extends beyond the occurrence of theft itself. It concerns the ability of criminal actors to exploit the routines, trust as well as assumptions that make everyday urban life possible. Public transportation, commercial interactions and encounters with strangers are normal features of life in Ghanaian cities (Twum, 2025). Yet these ordinary spaces and interactions can also create opportunities for deception and victimisation.
The purpose of this article is to examine changing patterns of confidence tricks and urban robbery in Ghana through public narratives shared on social media. Specifically, the article explores how these narratives reveal the exploitation of everyday trust, the construction of situational vulnerability through distraction and the adaptation and persistence of criminal methods. The analysis draws on Routine Activity Theory, Situational Crime Prevention and Crime Script Theory to understand how ordinary interactions may be transformed into opportunities for victimisation.
Methods and Materials
This article adopts a qualitative social media analysis. The primary material for the study was a video post published by Gossips24 Avenue on YouTube on 19 August 2026 (see Gossips24, 2026). The post generated public discussion about several alleged robbery and confidence-trick schemes reportedly occurring in Ghana, including transportation-related theft, an alleged pure-water scheme and confidence tricks involving gold, dollars and mercury.
A thematic analysis was used to identify recurring patterns within the post and comments. Analysis of the post and its 491 comments as at 31st August 2026 generated three interconnected themes: the exploitation of everyday trust, distraction and the construction of situational vulnerability, and criminal adaptation and collective awareness. Although the comments describe different alleged schemes, the analysis reveals common processes through which ordinary social interactions may be transformed into opportunities for victimisation. Selected comments were used as empirical illustrations and interpreted through Routine Activity Theory, Situational Crime Prevention and Crime Script Theory.
Results and Discussion
Before examining the major themes, it is important to outline the different scams that formed the context of the discussion. The accounts shared through the Gossips24 Avenue post and its comment section focused on four reported methods. The first concerns the alleged taxi scam, in which passengers reportedly enter vehicles occupied by individuals who appear to be ordinary commuters. According to accounts shared in the discussion, confusion may arise when a passenger attempts to leave the vehicle, including situations where the door allegedly fails to open. During this moment of confusion, valuables such as phones, purses and other belongings may allegedly be stolen.
The second concerns the reported pure-water scam. According to the account associated with the discussion, young men would sit with passengers at the back of a trotro and initiate an apparently ordinary interaction. They would allegedly buy pure water for one Ghana cedi and, when they could not provide change, give the pure water to the passenger. On the surface, there is little that appears threatening about such an interaction. Pure water is a routine part of everyday life in Ghana. It is bought and consumed by commuters, traders, students, workers and pedestrians every day. An interaction involving a small sachet of water may therefore appear completely insignificant. The concern arises from the reported experience of a mason, who recounted his experience on 26 July. According to his account, after he was given the pure water, he used some of it to wash his hands and face. He subsequently lost consciousness and later regained consciousness in a hospital, where he discovered that his belongings had been stolen. A second reported victim, Emmamuella Nyame, also recounted an experience involving a similar pure-water tactic. Her account adds another reported experience to the discussion and suggests that the alleged method deserves public attention and investigation.
The third reported method involves a confidence trick centred on gold, diamonds, dollars or mercury. According to the accounts discussed, individuals allegedly approach potential victims with stories about valuable items and gradually draw them into conversation or further interaction. Commenters also recalled similar experiences occurring years earlier, suggesting that this form of confidence trick may not be entirely new but may persist or reappear in different contexts.
Finally, the discussion referred to an alleged prophet scam, in which individuals reportedly present themselves as prophets or as possessing spiritual knowledge in order to establish trust and influence potential victims. Here, the alleged deception appears to depend on the social authority and trust associated with religious or spiritual identity.
Although these scams differ in their immediate methods, the analysis of the post and its comment section reveals three broader patterns: the exploitation of everyday trust, distraction and the construction of situational vulnerability, and criminal adaptation and collective awareness.
Exploiting Everyday Trust
The first theme concerns the exploitation of trust embedded in everyday urban life. The reported incidents did not necessarily begin with visible threats or physical force. Instead, they emerged from ordinary activities such as boarding a taxi, travelling with other passengers or engaging with strangers. One commenter described an alleged experience involving a driver, another man and an elderly woman:
“The driver plus another man in front and a lady at the back… very elderly woman ooo. Same tactics… And the woman stole my purse from my bag which contained my keys and money. They weren’t ready to stop the car for me to alight ooo. So I had to shout before.”
This account suggests that the alleged scheme depended partly on the appearance of normality. A passenger entering a vehicle may reasonably assume that the other occupants are fellow passengers. The description of the woman as “very elderly” is also significant because it suggests that perceived harmlessness may itself become part of the alleged deception.
Routine Activity Theory helps to explain this situation. According to Cohen & Felson (1979), crime occurs when a motivated offender, a suitable target and inadequate capable guardianship converge. In this case, the enclosed space of the vehicle may have limited the commenter’s access to assistance, while the presence of several individuals may have created an imbalance between the potential victim and the alleged offenders. The key issue, therefore, is not simply the presence of a valuable purse but the social and spatial circumstances that allegedly reduced the victim’s ability to protect it.The alleged pure-water and gold schemes reflect a similar pattern. They reportedly begin with ordinary interactions and objects that do not immediately appear threatening. The findings therefore suggest that confidence-based crimes may exploit the trust necessary for everyday urban interactions. The potential victim becomes vulnerable not necessarily because of carelessness but because the situation is initially interpreted as normal.
Distraction and the Construction of Situational Vulnerability
The second theme concerns the alleged use of distraction and confusion to create opportunities for theft. One commenter recalled an experience along the Ability Junction-Adjiriganor-American House route:
“I experienced a similar situation from Ability-Adjiriganor to American House early in the morning to work 3 years ago… It was when I was getting down, the door couldn’t open and I placed the laptop bag which had my phone and all my working tools between the guy and me. I got to the office, only to unpack and my phone was gone. I just thank God for my life.”
The account demonstrates how vulnerability may be produced during an interaction (Ahmed, 2026). The commenter was running late, was unexpectedly dropped before reaching the intended destination and then encountered difficulty opening the door. Attention was consequently directed towards leaving the vehicle rather than protecting personal belongings. Situational Crime Prevention is useful in interpreting this account because it focuses on the immediate circumstances that create opportunities for crime (Clarke, 1983, 1995). The phone was stolen not just because the person had a phone, but because the situation distracted the person and made them focus on something else, the problem with getting out of the taxi.
Crime Script Theory further helps explain the sequence of the encounter. Following Cornish (1994), the alleged incident can be understood as a progression: an ordinary journey, an unexpected change, a moment of confusion, the diversion of attention and the eventual discovery of the missing phone. Analysing the incident as a sequence is important because it shifts attention from the final act of theft to the processes through which the opportunity was allegedly created.
A similar experience of confusion appears in the comment concerning the gold and mercury scheme: “It’s like they hypnotise you, I was just following them, I didn’t even want any diamond at the time.” The commenter’s use of “hypnotise” should not necessarily be understood literally. Instead, it may describe an experience of intense persuasion, confusion or psychological absorption. Through the lens of Crime Script Theory, the interaction appears to have gradually drawn the individual into a situation that they later reconsidered as dangerous. In both the taxi and gold schemes, distraction and manipulation appear to be central to the alleged construction of vulnerability.
Criminal Adaptation and Collective Awareness
The third theme concerns the perceived ability of criminal methods to adapt and the role of collective awareness in responding to them. One commenter observed: “Last year the driver and old lady stealing was happening in Spintex-Sakumono road. I think when people get wind of it they move to another location.”
Although this comment does not establish that the same offenders moved between locations, it reflects a perception that criminal methods may change geographically once they become widely recognised. This can be interpreted through the literature on crime displacement, which suggests that offenders may alter their locations or methods in response to changing risks and opportunities (Guerette & Bowers, 2009).This has an important implication for security analysis. Rather than focusing exclusively on the locations where incidents occur, security agencies may also need to identify recurring modus operandi. The comments suggest that similar methods may be recognised across different places, even if the alleged offenders cannot be directly linked.
The discussion also revealed the importance of collective memory. One commenter stated: “These tricks have been in existence time in memorial. Just that lot if people may have forgotten the tricks. It is good that we’re creating awareness.”Another commenter similarly described the gold, dollar and mercury scheme as: “This one is a scam from the 90’s.” These comments suggest that criminal methods may persist even when public knowledge of them declines. The Gossips24 Avenue comment section therefore functions as a space where individuals share experiences, recall older methods and compare incidents across time and space. Awareness may function as a form of informal guardianship by enabling individuals to recognise suspicious patterns before an interaction progresses further. The value of the social media discussion, therefore, lies not in independently verifying every individual account but in revealing recurring public concerns and creating collective awareness about potential methods of victimisation.
Recommendations
- Passengers should remain attentive during taxi and trotro journeys, particularly when unusual circumstances arise. This does not mean treating every unfamiliar passenger as suspicious, but rather paying attention to unexpected changes during a journey and maintaining direct control over valuables such as phones, money, laptops and bags. Passengers should also exercise caution regarding unsolicited food or drinks from strangers.
- The reported gold, dollar and mercury schemes further highlight the need for caution when strangers present unexpected financial or business opportunities. Claims involving valuable commodities, secrecy, pressure or requests to follow strangers to unfamiliar locations should be treated with suspicion.
- The police and transport sector should also analyse recurring complaints for similarities in modus operandi, vehicle arrangements, sequences of events and locations rather than treating every report as an isolated incident.
- Transport operators and unions should strengthen systems that allow passengers to identify vehicles and drivers and report suspicious behaviour. Improving passenger security is also important for maintaining public confidence in legitimate taxi and trotro services.
Conclusion
This article has shown that the reported taxi, pure-water, gold and prophet scams involve more than the simple theft of property. They appear to exploit everyday trust, create distraction and confusion, and take advantage of temporary moments of vulnerability. Routine Activity Theory, Situational Crime Prevention and Crime Script Theory help explain how ordinary interactions may be transformed into opportunities for victimisation.
The findings suggest that security agencies should focus not only on where such incidents occur but also on recurring modus operandi. Public awareness is equally important. Social media discussions can preserve knowledge about both older and emerging scams, helping people recognise suspicious patterns. While individual accounts require verification, recurring reports may provide useful information for further security and intelligence investigation.
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