In a recent development, a Nigerian man, along with three Indian nationals, has been arrested by the Indian police for cheating several Indian women on matrimonial apps. The gang, which had been operating from Delhi for the past few months, posed as doctors, engineers, and information technology professionals to connect with women on several matrimonial apps. They took money from their victims on the pretext of clearing customs fees for gifts.
According to the police, the suspects used to scan profiles of the victims on matrimonial sites and later befriended them on social media such as Instagram and Facebook. The cybercrime team of Gurugram police disclosed that they recovered 25 mobile phones, 65 ATM cards, 34 cheque books, and 12 passbooks from the fraudsters. The suspects were identified as Chibaka alias Tall Issa of Nigeria and Delhi residents Aman Kumar (26), Rahul Singh (28), and Santosh Kumar (38).
The police cracked down on the gang members after a 36-year-old woman complained on March 22 that she was duped of ₹16 lakh (about N9m). The woman alleged that on January 26 this year, she received a friend request on Instagram in which the person introduced himself as a doctor living in the United Kingdom. “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,” said Sampa Pal, a resident of DLF Phase-4.
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 realized that I had been cheated as they were asking me to deposit another ₹7.26 lakh,” said Pal.
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. The police traced the internet protocol addresses of the suspects, and a raid was conducted by a team led by Jasvir Singh, station house officer of the Cyber Crime police station, and the suspects were arrested from different places in Delhi on Wednesday night.
The gang had opened more than 100 bank accounts that were used by them to transfer money. One of them used to withdraw money through ATMs from different areas and many times traveled to another city to evade being identified by police. The police said the suspects were cheating women for months in the name of sending/receiving gifts. “In many cases, the victims received calls from Mumbai airport officials who told them that their friend had been detained for carrying pounds/US dollars and expensive gifts. They were asked to pay money in lakhs to “register” the valuables. The victims were then asked to spend more money in the name of securing the gifts and freeing their friends