Fort police retrieve over Rs 50 lakh lost through online frauds

Thiruvananthapuram: Fort police successfully recovered over Rs 50 lakh that city residents had lost to online scams. They said that the money will be given back to its rightful owners.
Recently, police arrested Rafeek, 43, of Perinthalmanna in Malappuram, during a probe into a case registered by a Chalai-based businessman. During interrogation, police found that Rafeek was involved in several other online frauds. He has defrauded several other people through cyberfraud. They then froze the money in his account through proper procedures.
Now, steps have been initiated to retrieve the money from his accounts and hand over it to the victims.
The accused defrauded the businessman by offering a free online class on stock-market trading. Later, he was advised to invest in the market to gain attractive profits. Trusting him the man invested money, only to be deceived by the accused.
"The businessman was cheated of Rs 3.75 lakh. We were able to trace him through an investigation focusing on the bank account details," said police.