E-Paper
Two duped in ‘drugs in parcel’ fraud cases
The accused called the victims and told them that drugs were found in their parcels and extorted money from them on the pretext of not taking legal action
The Pune city police have lodged two ‘drugs in parcel’ fraud cases where the victims have been duped to the tune of ₹31 lakh by fraudsters who posed as police officials.
The accused called the victims and told them that drugs were found in their parcels and extorted money from them on the pretext of not taking legal action.
In the first case, a 37-year-old lodged a complaint with the Sinhagad police against a person, Harshvardhan, an officer from cyber crime Mumbai, who called him and said that a parcel in his name on way to Taiwan from Mumbai had drugs and asked him bank account details for verification. On obtaining the account number, the fraudster directed him to pay ₹27,98,776.
Jayant Rajurkar, police inspector (crime), said, “The victim is an IT professional who got a call from a fraudster who told him that a criminal case has been registered against him after drugs were found in the parcel in his name. He later told him that the victim would have to give a guarantee (surety) to obtain relaxation in the case and for that RBI verification was essential. He initially asked him to pay ₹20 lakh as surety and later took the remaining amount convincing him that it would be refunded.”
The police have invoked IPC 419, 420 and section 34 along with IT Act sections 66 C and 66 against the accused.
In the second case, a 34-year-old victim received a call from two persons identified as Jaideep Rajput of a private courier company and Naresh Gupta Banerjee of Mumbai Crime Branch on October 1.
The duo threatened to arrest him in a case of parcel deployment to Thailand from Mumbai which had drugs.
The duo told him that his name would be cleared off if he paid them and forced him to transfer ₹3.26 lakh to their bank account.
The case was first lodged with the cyber cell which investigated and forwarded it to the Yerawada police station where the FIR was lodged.
The police have invoked IPC 170, 34,419, 420, sections 66C and D of the IT Act 2000. The FIR was lodged on December 6 by the victim due to the delay in sending the investigation report by the cyber crime cell.
Balkrushna Kadam, police inspector, said, “The accused threatened to arrest him in a narcotics-related case and later asked him to transfer ₹3.26 lakh into their account for issuing a ‘ No Objection Certificate ’ for giving him legal clearance in the case.”
“The victim fell for the bait and was cheated by the fraudsters,” he said.
