4 suspects steal $5,000, passports from two Iraqi nationals

Gurugram: Four suspects allegedly stole $5,000 and passports from two Iraqi nationals by posing as police officers in Sector 38, said the police Monday, adding that they stopped the victims on the pretext of checking their passports and visa-related documents

Gurugram: Four suspects allegedly stole $5,000 and passports from two Iraqi nationals by posing as police officers in Sector 38, said the police Monday, adding that they stopped the victims on the pretext of checking their passports and visa-related documents.

4 suspects steal $5,000, passports from two Iraqi nationals

According to Gurugram police, the incident took place on at around 8pm on Saturday, when the victims were walking to their guest house at Sector 38. In the police complaint, one of the victims identified as Sabah Abdul Hasan (62), said he arrived in the city from Iraq on January 25 for medical treatment of his brother-in-law.

Preet Pal Sangwan, assistant commissioner of police (crime), said that the victims had taken accommodation at a guest house in Sector 38. “On February 4, after a check-up at a dental hospital in Faridabad, the victim and his brother-in-law were walking on a service road, when a car stopped in front of them and they were asked to show their passports,” he said.

The complainant said four people were seated in the car. “They claimed to be police officers and asked for their visas and passport documents for a verification. On the pretext of checking the documents, the occupants in the car stole $5000 and also took our passports and escaped,” the victim said in the FIR.

Police said they have registered a case under Section 379 (theft) and 420 (cheating) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) at Sadar police station. “We are checking CCTVs in the area to identify the suspects. No arrests have been made yet,” ACP Sangwan said.

On January 11, Gurugram police had mapped the most unsafe stretches in the city from where foreign nationals were frequently targeted by unidentified suspects posing as policemen.

Nine such cases have been reported between August last year and January this year, police said, adding that the victims were mostly from countries in Africa and the Middle East. They also admitted that they have not been able to arrest even a single suspect in any one of these cases yet.