A Nigerian, Omeleze Fred, based in India has been nabbed for a romance scam in which he allegedly duped unsuspecting female victims.
Fred was nabbed by the Cyber Crimes Police station, Cyberabad East, for cheating Hyderabadi women by impersonating as an American national, the Hindu/Deccan Chronicle reports.
The 35-year-old Delta state-born resides in Mehrauli, New Delhi and preliminary investigation, according to the police, revealed that he came to India in 2012 and was staying in different localities in New Delhi.
However, after his original visit visa expired two months after arriving in India, he prepared a fake Indian visa sticker and pasted it on his passport and used for renting a house.
On what led to his arrest, Inspector Md. Riyazuddin said Fred pretended to be an American soldier on Facebook and lured victims expressing his love and extorted money in the name of investments.
Riyazuddin said the suspect created several Facebook profiles by putting photos of smart looking Americans and was chatting with Indian women online after searching for their profiles.
“In the case for which he was arrested, Fred had trapped the female victim by introducing himself as one Benson, an American soldier serving in Afghanistan. After several conversations, he told her that he wanted to come to India and settle with her by investing his savings, which he told was about five million US dollars.
“The victim later received a call from a lady who introduced herself as a manager in the customs department of the airport in New Delhi.
“She was told that Mr. Benson was apprehended by the customs department for bringing US Dollars and gold and diamond jewellery.
“At the same time, Fred, as ‘Benson’ also rang her up and informed her that if she pay the taxes as told, the customs officer would release his money and jewellery which they would spend in their future life,” the police Inspector added.
Fred’s victim was said to have believed him and transferred Rs.2.5 lakh in the bank accounts provided by him.
“Later she realized that she was cheated,” the inspector said, adding that the accused was brought to Hyderabad and was remanded to judicial custody on Wednesday.
“The investigators found a whopping 5 lakh mobile numbers and one lakh email IDs from his laptop which was seized,” Inspector Riyazuddin added.
Comentarios