Staff Reporter :
Criminal Investigation Depart (CID) of police on Wednesday detained 12 foreign nationals and a fake Customs officer from the city’s Pallabi area on charge of taking Taka five to six crore from social media users through fraudulence.
They were identified as Nandika Clint, Cletas Achuna, Oyukulov Timti, Akin Wisdom, Chigozi, Ivunde Gabriel Obina, Celestine Patrick, Mardi Namdi, Mardi Namdu, Ordu Chukordu Sammi, Dubuokan Somayina,
Jerome Presiamas and a Bangladesh fake customs officer Tahat Ara Khanam alias Farzana Mahiuddin. All of them are nationals of Nizerian.
Additional Deputy Inspector General of CID of Dhaka Metro Sheikh Md Rezaul Haider confirmed the news to media and said the arrestees used to impersonate customs officials while talking money from the victims.
In just two months, this racket has swindled around 5 to 6 crore taka by using different social media networks like Facebook. Under the leadership of Farzana, 12 Nigerians have been living illegally and involved in several criminal activities, the CID official said.
He said a team of CID carried out a raid based on a complaint from a victim who lost Taka 4.25 lakh to the gang’s scam.
About the process of the scam, the CID official said a Facebook user got connected with an opposite gender person and built friendship through chats over a period of months.
At one stage, the fraud foreigner proposed to send the victim a costly gift on messenger and later sent freight documents on the messenger too. The foreigner also told the victim that the package would contain million dollar worth of items and asked him to receive the parcel from the customs office at Chattogram Airport, he said.
Then, the fake Customs Commissioner Rahat Ara Khanam alias Farzana – called the victim and asked him to deposit Taka 4.25 lakh in several bank accounts for customs clearance of the so-called parcel, CID officer Haider added.
The victim then deposited Taka 3.73 lakh to bank accounts specified by the gang. Later, the gang discontinued communication with the victim and then the victim realised that he was cheated by them and made the complaint, he said.
The additional DIG, however, said the gang made at least Taka 5-6 crore in last two months through scams.
