A retired policewoman’s daughter filed a complaint with the Koparkhairane police after she fell for a proposal on Facebook and was cheated of ₹9.77 lakh.
The victim, a 30-year-old private tutor, was approached by a man, who introduced himself as Benson Morgan from London, via Facebook on February 2. He sent her a friend request, which she accepted, and after chatting for a while they exchanged phone numbers.
Less than three weeks into their friendship, the accused told the woman that he wanted to marry her and would be coming to meet her. On March 2, she received a call from a woman named Indira, who claimed to be calling from the customs department at New Delhi international airport. Ms. Indira told the complainant that Mr. Morgan had been detained by the customs department. She also made the victim speak to a man who claimed to be the airport manager.
According to the complaint, the ‘airport manager’ told her that Mr. Morgan was travelling with £50,000 without a ‘money laundering certificate’. He further asked her to pay ₹65,000 for the certificate and to get him released.
The next day, the complainant received another call from someone who claimed to be from the Reserve Bank of India and asked her to open a bank account for Mr. Morgan to deposit the U.K. currency. For this, she was asked to pay ₹1.25 lakh and later another ₹2.4 lakh which the fraudster said was for the ‘C.O.T. code’.
“Between March 2 and 6, the fraudsters called the complainant several times and made her pay money under various claims. She paid a total of ₹9.77 lakh in the name of ‘tax code’, for upgrading the bank account to deposit the money and various other reasons. She only realised that she was being cheated when someone called and asked her to pay ₹2.5 lakh to access the PIN for upgrading the account. She then refused to pay,” a police officer from Koparkhairane police station said.
After the refusal, Mr. Morgan video called the victim on Saturday and told her that he is being deported to London as she refused to pay the additional amount. He abruptly disconnected the call saying he would return the money.
On Sunday, she registered a case with the Koparkhairane police for cheating under the Indian Penal Code and provisions of the IT Act.
