The India Police on Thursday paraded a Nigerian who was arrested for allegedly cheating several Indian women on matrimonial applications.
The suspect, identified simply as Chibaka alias Tall Issa of Nigeria, was arrested alongside three Indians: Aman Kumar (26), Rahul Singh (28), and Santosh Kumar (38).
According to the police, their victims were deceived with fake identities like doctors, engineers and information technology professionals and duped several ladies ladies on the pretext of clearing customs fees for gifts.
NIGERIACRIME learned that 25 mobile phones, 65 ATM cards, 34 cheque books and 12 passbooks were recovered by the cybercrime team of Gurugram police.
Speaking on the development, the Assistant commissioner of police (cyber) Priyanshu Diwan, told journalists that the fraudsters have been operating from Delhi in the last few months.
According to him, “The Nigerian was the kingpin of the gang and met the other suspects in Laxmi Nagar area of Delhi. They used to scan profiles of the victims on matrimonial sites and later befriended them on social media such as Instagram and Facebook,” he said.
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The ACP noted that a 36-year-old victim reported on March 22 that she was duped of ₹16 lakh (about N9m). He said that led to the arrest of the syndicate.
According to the woman, Sampa Pal, on January 26, 2023, she received a friend request on Instagram in which the person introduced himself as a doctor living in the United Kingdom.
The resident of DLF Phase-4 “We exchanged our numbers and started chatting on WhatsApp. The suspect said he would be sending some gold items and £20,000. On January 30, I received a call from a woman who introduced herself as an employee of a courier company in Mumbai and said that gold and foreign currency had arrived in my name.”
The woman asked the victim to deposit ₹55,000 as tax and after receiving the money, she again asked to deposit ₹3,27,920. Again, on February 2, the suspect asked her to deposit ₹3 lakh followed by ₹2.98 lakh. “It did not stop here and in total I deposited ₹16 lakh within a week and realised that I had been cheated as they were asking me to deposit another ₹7.26 lakh,” said Pal.
Police said after conducting an investigation, a case was registered under Section 120 B (conspiracy), 419 (impersonating) and 420 (cheating) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) at the Cyber Crime police station on February 17.
Assistant Commissioner of Police (crime), Preet Pal Sangwan, said the suspects were arrested from different places in Delhi on Wednesday night after the station house officer of the Cyber Crime police station, Jasvir Singh, led his team to raid the suspects.
“During questioning, the suspects revealed that the Nigerian man was deported from Mumbai eight years ago, who returned to India on a Schengen visa and another passport. We are still verifying whether his passport is original or forged. He was continuously active in committing matrimonial frauds,” ACP Sangwan said.