Using the guise of a prospective girlfriend, a man scammed a Jubilee Hills resident out of Rs 45 lakhs.
Mothe Ashok, a 28-year-old native from Nuzvid in the Krishna district, made an account on Facebook using the name Indhusha Tummala.
Ashok, who is into online gaming, needed money and decided to con people by pretending to be a woman searching for a marriage partner.
Having checked a few profiles, he sent a friend request to Praveen, a businessman from Jubilee Hills, who accepted it when he believed the request was a legitimate account of a woman. Ashok and Praveen chatted on Facebook Messenger for some time.
Ashok asked Praveen to send him money several times, each time citing a different reason.
Ashok’s lies fooled the victim from Jubilee Hills into sending him Rs 45 lakhs over the course of two years. At one point, Ashok posing as ‘Indhusha’ also took money from the victim, claiming that both she and her mother suffer from the Covid-19 disease.
Anand said that on one occasion, he took Rs.3 lakh under the pretext of college fees, another time, he took Rs.10 lakh under the pretext of his mother’s treatment for Covid-19, and on another occasion, he took Rs.15 lakh on the pretext of getting Covid himself,” adding that Praveen became suspicious and contacted the authorities.
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Interesting enough, the victim never questioned the fake ‘Indhusha’ as Ashok used a voice changer application to change his voice into that of a woman and sent him voice messages.
Using an app that changed his voice, Ashok began to communicate regularly with Praveen. He even sent pictures to avoid suspicion, said City Police Commissioner CV Anand.
The Cybercrime police were able to recover just two lakhs from the accused, as the rest of the money was spent on online gaming.
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