Police were notified by NAB about fraudulent card activity at Wodonga Plaza ATMs on Friday night and swarmed the shopping centre just before 10pm.

Saad Samad, 47, Tarek Hamze, 33, and Daniel Singh, 33, were caught with cash and receipts detailing their alleged fraudulent activities.

They were all released on bail and allowed to return home to Sydney after appearing in Wodonga Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday facing charges of conspiracy to commit fraud, going to a location equipped to steal and possessing proceeds of crime.

Detective Sergeant Graeme Simpfendorfer told the court the criminal enterprise had claimed $60,000 from known thefts at NAB ATMs in Wodonga, Chiltern and Melbourne since March, but it was possible the total could be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.

It was also possibly connected to fraud offences being investigated by the NSW police major crime squad.

Police believe a cloning device, located in a Kia Carnival parked nearby in Wodonga, used details the criminals purchased from “skimmers” who scanned the credit card information of unknowing victims.

The device then transferred this information onto “load-and-go” Australia Post and other gift cards, which could be used to withdraw cash at ATMs.

“They seem to do a run from Sydney to Melbourne then back up – they seem to do it on a weekend before police can respond and banks are notified,” Detective Simpfendorfer said.

“This criminal syndicate is quite well-planned and unfortunately for them on this occasion, they were caught in regional Victoria … We believe we’ve intercepted the syndicate prior to the majority of the offending.”

Samad, the accused syndicate ringleader, was allegedly caught by police with $19,854 in cash and a receipt showing a transfer of $3446 to a bank in Lebanon.

Police used capsicum spray during the arrest when he allegedly tried to assault them to get away.

“It does concern me money’s going offshore,” Detective Simpfendorfer said.

“That seems to be the MO of the syndicate: money’s defrauded in Australia and sent overseas.”

Hamze allegedly had $4000 cash on him, plus three small bags of methamphetamine and one small bag of cannabis.

His tearful brother offered $50,000 of the family’s money to the court as a surety for Hamze’s release on bail.

Samad was also released with a $100,000 surety and both men were forced to hand in their passports.

The case was adjourned until August.