22-Year-Old Nabbed For Role in Vizag Cyber Scam
Visakhapatnam: Visakhapatnam Cyber Crime Police arrested a 22-year-old man for his role in facilitating a sophisticated ‘digital arrest’ scam that duped a retired government employee of over Rs 1.6 crore.
The victim, Nukala Sitharamanjaneyulu (77), received calls from people pretending to be a Blue Dart courier and a representative of the Mumbai Police. The fraudsters threatened him, claiming that illegal transactions were taking place in his name and that he was under CBI investigation.
Under the guise of a “digital arrest”, the fraudsters forced the old man to transfer large amounts of money to various bank accounts, saying that he was part of the investigation. 1,60,54,000 was defrauded this way.
Following a complaint, the cybercrime police tracked the movement of funds through multiple accounts and found that some of the amount was deposited in the account of Rapelli Abhinav (22), a resident of Ramagundam in Telangana’s Karimnagar district.
Using technical analysis, police tracked and arrested Abhinav in Ramagundam. During interrogation, he admitted that he gave his bank account to cybercriminals in exchange for a commission and withdrew the money and handed it over to them.
Police said his account was used in cybercrime cases registered in many states. While the defendant was sentenced to 15 days of judicial detention, his bank accounts and mobile phones were also seized.
