Hyderabad, July 22: Central Crime Station (CCS) sleuths on Wednesday arrested the kingpin of a Nigerian online fraud gang. The online fraud gang was operating from New Delhi and had misappropriated several crores of rupees by transferring the money of bank customers into their accounts and using the same for online purchases.
The gang was caught following a complaint by a Karkhana-based customer of the ICICI Bank, Jagannath Vidyala. On June 9, he had gone to an AT M to withdraw money from his account but to his surprise, found that Rs 6.23 lakh had been withdrawn on June 7 and 8 without his knowledge.
He had a balance of only Rs 85.
He reported the matter to the ICICI Bank management and subsequently to the police. During investigations, police found that Vidyala’s bank account had been hacked into and money withdrawn by a person in New Delhi. “Our detectives went to Delhi and caught two Nigerians but the kingpin could not be nabbed immediately,’’ additional commissioner of police (crimes) N Narasimha Reddy told reporters. The arrested, Frank alias Emanual and E Celestain Chibuki, both from Lagos, were produced before a court in New Delhi. Later, they were brought to the city on a prisoner transit warrant and remanded in judicial custody.
The CCS sleuths got information about the whereabouts of the kingpin, Ganesh Kumar Agarwal alias Prince alias John Periria, a 29-year-old from Kolkata, and reportedly picked him up in Delhi on Tuesday. However, the police said he was arrested on Wednesday.
–Agencies