Engineer sends obscene messages to women staff from boss’ number, held

The police claimed that during interrogation, accused broke down and told them that he had sent the messages to humiliate his boss following his poor appraisal.

The Ghatkopar police arrested a civil engineer on Tuesday, for allegedly using his employer’s mobile number and e-mail address to send obscene messages to his women employees. Accused Rakesh Desai, 38, reportedly told police that he was upset with the Ghatkopar-based company’s CEO for not giving him a good appraisal and so decided to get back at him.

The CEO had approached Ghatkopar senior police inspector Venkat Patil earlier this year with the complaint that his mobile number and e-mail address had been used illegally to send vulgar messages to former and current female employees at his company. The police then registered an FIR against an unknown person on March 17 and the case was given to the cyber cell of the police station.

The Mumbai police has created cyber cells in every police station since December last year, and this is one of the first serious crimes to be solved by a police station-level cyber cell.

Police inspector Vilas Datir, sub inspector Santosh Patil and constable Santosh Gidh began tracking the number from which the messages had been sent. “After analysis, it came to light that the messages and e-mails were actually sent using a software. There are certain softwares available using which one can camouflage the actual number/e-mail address and display the number/ e-mail address of one’s choice,” said an officer linked to the probe.

Further analysis helped police find the actual mobile number from which the messages and e-mails had been sent, and Desai was identified and interrogated. The police claimed that during interrogation, Desai broke down and told them that he had sent the messages to humiliate his boss following his poor appraisal.

Adept at using different software, he sent obscene emails, text messages to woman colleagues from his employer’s number. They in turn confronted the employer regarding these messages. When complaints continued to pour in even from former employees, the complainant decided to approach the police.