A year on,cops reach dead end in online scam

Bangare called the number mentioned in the e-mail and spoke to an executive who told her that three employees of the company will visit her and as soon as she makes the payment of Rs 15 lakh,she will be able to receive the cash prize. Accordingly,three Nigerians had come to her house on March 21,2010,with the prize money.

“After Bangare gave them Rs 15 lakh in cash,the Nigerians opened the suitcase carrying the prize money and were about to hand it over to her when one of them saw that the notes,which were in US dollars,were from an expired date. The three apologised to Bangare and said the company had made a mistake. They told Bangare that she would have to pay Rs 3 lakh more. She agreed and gave them a cheque of Rs 3 lakh. They assured Bangare that they would return the next day with Rs 5 crore,” inspector S Sawant of Kapurbawdi police said.

Bangare waited for two days and realised that she had been duped. She then approached the police and registered a complaint against the three Nigerians. The local police transferred the case to the Thane Cyber Crime police to investigate the source of the e-mail.

After almost a year,the Cyber Crime police returned the case papers and files to the local police station,saying they had reached a dead end since both the e-mail and the phone number given were from South Africa.

“The Cyber Crime police told us that they would not be able to arrest the Nigerians and handed the case back to us on August 10 and asked us to investigate the matter as a cheating case. We are also helpless as we will not be able to arrest the men unless they come to India,” Sawant said.