Nigerian held for lottery fraud

Franklin Idiumo was apprehended following investigations into complaints about cheating a woman of Rs 22 lakh after falsely telling her that she had won a lottery of Rs 1.7 crore B S Jaiswal, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Outer), said.

The victim approached police on January 12 that she received a call that she has won a lottery and she was lured to deposit some money for claiming it.

She paid Rs 22,38,980 through various instalments in different HDFC Bank accounts as asked by the fraudsters.

During the said transaction, she got suspicious and reported it to the bank which froze the account in which she deposited the money, Jaiswal said.

The victim informed the police two days ago that she received a phone call from one person that her lottery amount that has been sent at her residence through one of their representatives.

"Idiumo came to her house at Rohini. He was intercepted at the spot along with an electronic safe. On opening, it was found to be containing small packets of black hard papers concealed in white cotton.

"Idiumo also could not produce any valid travel documents for his presence in India," Jaiswal said.

Idiumo told police that he along with his fellow nationals cheated people by creating a fake website of RBI and sent text messages to people randomly wherein they stated that they have won a large sum of money in a lottery.

The people who replied to their messages were asked to deposit a sum of money in an account number they told in exchange of a code that would enable them to facilitate the transfer of the said money in to their account.

Further they told them to deposit more money on one pretext or the other.

They used to befool people by giving them black paper and convince them that these are defaced US dollars which can be brought into real form by applying special chemical, Jaiswal said.