Thane crime branch arrests six who withdrew cash after ‘helping’ people use ATM

The accused would notice the PIN while the customer punched in and would pretend to help but after saying that the machine has stopped working, return the victim a duplicate card.

Six people were arrested from Ahmedabad highway for robbing people at the ATM kiosks.

The accused are from Uttar Pradesh and have also committed similar crimes there.

According to the police, the accused targeted customers who are not familiar using the ATMs.

They have committed crimes in Thane, Mira-Bhayandar, Vasai-Virar, Nalasopara, Mumbra, Kopri, Panvel, Padgha, Dahisar, Bhiwandi, Kalyan and Shahpur.Posing as customers, they would stand behind the victim in a queue. They would then offer to help them.

“The accused would notice the PIN while the customer punched in. The accused would pretend to help but after saying that the machine has stopped working, return the victim a duplicate card. After the victim would leave the ATM, the accused withdrew the money from his account,” said Jairaj Ranaware, senior police inspector, Thane crime branch, unit 5.

Aftab Jahir Alam Khan, 28, Santosh Omprakash Giri, 38, Kamlesh Yadav, 27; Vijay Pandey, 48, Alok Singh, 30, Ahmed Hussain Khan, 24, were arrested on Thursday.

The accused have been committing crimes for one and half years and 26 complaints have been lodged against them. By using the same trick, each accused has robbed around ₹40,000 to ₹60,000, added Ranaware.

Aftab Jahir Alam Khan has committed cases against him in Uttar Pradesh for similar cases. “He was arrested by the Uttar Pradesh police and released on bail. While the another accused named Santosh Giri, who has also number of complaints lodged against him, in Azamgad district of Uttar Pradesh for committing similar crime.

“After coming to Mumbai, he has started working as a manager at Film City in Mumbai. The investigation is still on,” said Ranaware.

The people using ATMs should “Always press ‘cancel’ button after transactions to avoid misuse of accounts,” added Ranaware.