Team Goemkarponn
PANAJI: Two more people have been taken into custody by the Cyber Crime Police in relation to the digital arrest scam, in which scammers impersonating Delhi Crime Branch police defrauded a 68-year-old woman out of Rs 1 crore.
There are now seven accused people in jail after the recent arrests of Rakesh Patil and Sachin Patil, both of whom reside in Raigad, Maharashtra.
They have connections to a hawala network and operated mule bank accounts for money transfers. Consequently, our team went to Mumbai on February 26 and took them into custody. Rahul Gupta, Superintendent of Police (Cyber Crime), who escorted the group to Maharashtra
Prior to this, Rahul Mishra of Uttar Pradesh was arrested on January 29. Before him, Visakh R and Muhammadshan from Kerala, as well as Yaramala Venkateswarlu and Roshan Shaikh from Andhra Pradesh, were taken into custody.
According to the FIR, the accused falsely claimed that Bernadette Fernandes had been the subject of a police complaint when he messaged her on WhatsApp between December 26 and 28, 2024. One of the scammers allegedly forced her to deposit Rs 1 crore across three separate bank accounts by sending her fake paperwork purporting to be from the Supreme Court of India.
During interrogation, SP Gupta further disclosed that Rakesh and Sachin admitted to being co-accused Rahul Mishra’s associates and helping to provide mule accounts that were used to swiftly transfer stolen money.
In addition to freezing Rs 40 lakh, Cyber Crime Police have seized eight cell phones, one laptop, and two hard drives.
The Cyber Crime Police reaffirmed their warning to the public to be wary of bogus calls from individuals claiming to be law enforcement or Enforcement Directorate (ED) personnel who are requesting money.
