Hyderabad: Two Nigerians who were caught by the Mahankali police bought expensive handicraft goods in bulk and exported them to Nigeria with the money they had earned through fraud.
The duo — Patrick Okwuokenye, 31, and P. Festus Iteh, 28, both from Gbor city of Nigeria — were living in Delhi and luring innocent people after convincing them that they had won lottery worth crores of rupees.
“They would ask the victim to deposit the processing charges in different bank accounts and withdrew the money through ATMs in Delhi. They used bank accounts of Indian citizens for the money transactions to evade police,” said police commissioner Anurag Sharma.
The detective inspector of Mahankali police, A. Srinivas Rao, unearthed the Nigerian scam following a complaint from a city resident. The accused people had lured and cheated many victims from across the country by operating from Malaviya Nagar in New Delhi. Another accused is still absconding.
The crooks approached known people in Delhi, mainly north-eastern natives, and took permission to use their bank accounts, through which the transactions were taking place. “They do not have any property in India.
They export the handicraft goods to Nigeria with victims’ money, sell those goods in their country, and make money. This is a new modus operandi,” said Anurag Sharma.
In the scam, the duo took phone numbers and email IDs from Internet database and sent bulk SMSes and emails to victims across the country informing them that they had won a lottery worth Rs 125 crore.
“The duo managed to convince the victims who responded to their messages. They provided bank accounts and asked them deposit lakhs of rupees as processing char-ges,” said Sharma.
The Mahankali police started investigating the case after Mahankali resident Mahendra Patel lodged a complaint stating that a woman, Ashakiran, from Kukatpally cheated him by taking Rs 49 lakh.
In the probe, it was found that Ashakiran was herself trapped by the Nigerians who promised her Rs125 crore. As processing charge, she took money from Patel promising him 2.5 per cent of the money and paid the Nigerians.
The accused people Patrick Okwuokenye and P Festus Iteh were running a handicraft business in Delhi for the last few years.
