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Cyber criminal takes chips seller on Chandigarh holiday to access bank account
A 27-year-old chips seller was duped by cyber fraudsters into laundering ₹1.93 crore using his bank account while enjoying a luxury trip to Chandigarh.
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A gang of cyber fraudsters took a 27-year-old chips seller on a six-day all-expenses-paid trip to Chandigarh, gave him ₹50,000 in cash, and used his bank account as a mule to route ₹1.93 crore siphoned from victims across multiple cities, including Gurugram, police said on Friday.
The seller, identified as Sumit Kumar from Narnaul, was arrested on Tuesday during the investigation of an investment fraud case lodged by a Gurugram-based telecom engineer.
Police said Sumit’s bank account was used to launder funds between May 28 and June 3, during which time the fraudsters kept him entertained at a Chandigarh hotel.
The suspect had made Sumit stay at Hotel Greenland in Sector-125, Chandigarh, which has a room rent of upto ₹5000 per day. As per police officials, it was for the first time that Sumit was staying in a hotel, that too, outside his hometown and out of excitement, he didn’t even care to check what was the hotel name where he was put up.
He had the privilege to order the costliest food Chinese and visible in the menu along with different desserts after lunch and dinner besides ordering Indian and foreign liquor via room service.
Investigators said that the suspect spent somewhere around ₹55,000 on the overall stay at the hotel and food to operate for the cybercrime gang along with paying ₹50,000 to Sumit for providing his account access to the gang.
Investigators said that ₹21.33 lakh out of the ₹1.93 crore was part of a ₹70.26 lakh sum stolen from a 52-year-old telecom engineer living in Sector 71. The victim, an employee of a Finnish communication device company, was duped between April 22 and June 2 through an investment scam. He registered an FIR at the Cybercrime police station (south) on June 9.
As per police, Kumar was on two-day police remand for interrogation till Friday during which he disclosed details of the suspects including the who had accompanied him to Chandigarh.
“He was promised good food, liquor and a nice hotel, and all expenses were taken care of. Once they reached Chandigarh on May 28, Mohit took possession of Sumit’s account credentials and phone. Over the next six days, crores were routed through his account, which Mohit and his gang remitted to other accounts,” said Sandeep Kumar, Gurugram police PRO.
Sumit was largely kept uninvolved in the details of the scam. “He enjoyed the trip, unaware of the full scale of the fraud, but complicit in allowing his account to be used,” Kumar said.
Upon returning to Mahendragarh, Sumit was paid ₹50,000 in cash for “renting” his account, and Mohit vanished. Police recovered Sumit’s phone and two SIM cards linked to the transactions. Raids are on to arrest Mohit and his accomplices.
