Two Nigerian nationals convicted of scamming a woman in Chennai

The convicted persons, based in New Delhi, made a false matrimonial profile, made friends with the victim, and then pretended to have sent her a gift for which she was required to pay a "registration fee" to collect; they were given a five-year severe prison sentence.

 

The Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Court in Egmore, Chennai in Tamil Nadu found two Nigerian Nationals guilty of crimes such as obtaining money through a 'gift parcel' scam and scamming a woman in Perambur, Chennai, and sentenced them to prison.

According to the lawsuit, a 45-year-old lady created a profile on a Matrimonial website in July 2021. She had been divorced and wanted to be remarried. Following this, a person named Mohammed Salim sent her an ' interest request'.  He claimed to be a doctor in the Netherlands. Later, he told her that he had sent her a gift parcel worth several lakh rupees for which she needed to pay some amount of money as ' registration and conversion' charges.

The victim received a phone call from a woman demanding payment for the package. Following this, the victim paid Rs. 28,000. Then, the woman called the victim once again and informed her that foreign currency was found inside the parcel. As a result, she needed to pay a penalty amount of Rs.77,000 according to the woman. She then the victim again and asked for the conversion charges of Rs. 1, 80, 000.

 Next, the woman called the victim once more and asked for a payment of Rs. 95, 000. The victim declined to pay the amount following which she received a call from Asif, who claimed to be the brother of Salim. According to him, his brother had attempted suicide and they would come to India if she did not pay the money. Next, the victim lodged a police complaint.

 According to the investigations, the scammers used four Indian bank accounts and three Indian mobile numbers to commit the crime. They extracted a total of Rs 4.5 lakh from the victim.

  A team from the Cybercrime wing traveled to New Delhi. With the help of CCTV footage, they successfully identified the Nigerian Nationals. 

In the end, the fraudsters were sentenced to five years of imprisonment along with a fine of Rs. 25,000 having been imposed on both Nigerian Nationals.