Foreign woman makes hoax call to get back at hotel staff

BENGALURU: A foreign national sent police into a tizzy by claiming a huge stock of explosives had been stored at a star hotel near UB City in central business district (CBD). Investigations proved the woman had made the hoax call to take revenge on the hotel staff.
Vidhana Soudha police have approached the court seeking permission to book a case against the woman, an OCI (overseas citizen of India) card-holder from Canada.
Around 6am on April 25, the police control room received a call saying explosives had been stored in the hotel and they would be used to trigger blasts across the city. The female caller also named the hotel manager and said he was coordinating logistics pertaining to the explosives. “He has a blueprint about the placement of bombs,” she told police.
Not wanting to take a chance in the wake of the Sri Lanka bombings, police teams with sniffer dogs and explosive experts rushed to the hotel and carried out extensive searches, but in vain. After declaring it a hoax, cops started tracking the mobile number from which the call was made. An officer said: “The call came from a phone belonging to a private security guard working on Double Road. When questioned, he said a woman had approached him seeking his mobile. She told him she had lost her cellphone and wanted to call her family.” The guard claimed she spoke in English, returned the phone and left.
Police scanned CCTV footage from the neighbouring area and managed to spot the woman. “We questioned the hotel manager. When the CCTV footage was shown to him, he identified her and recalled a strange incident that had taken place,” sources said.
According to the manager, the woman had used the spa in the hotel a few days ago and had left without making the payment. Since it was a huge amount and she was a regular visitor, the manager had collected the dues on April 24 when she arrived along with friends, police said. She got furious as she felt insulted by the manager in front of her friends.
“The woman wanted to take revenge. She has been identified and we have booked a case of non- cognizable report against her. We have sought the court’s permission to register criminal case, ” a cop added.