Pramesh S Jain
The Central Crime Branch officials on Monday arrested three policemen including a suspended constable from Davanagere who lured a city based medical shop owner promised to get back the money he lost in illegal gold trade and made away with rupees four lakh.
Suspecting something fishy,the victim,Tabrez J, approached the City Police Commissioner with a petition who handed over the case to CCB for a detailed probe .
According to the complaint,Tabrez,who owned a medical shop in Devanahalli was approached by a man identified as Ramesh for a general medicine in march this year .
He befriended him after a couple of visit and offered him to sell four kilos of Gold Coins for a cheaper rate from his acquaintance while working in a field in Harihara in Davanagere .
After clinching the deal,Tabrez went to check the gold coins at a village near Harihara and confirmed its genuine.He agreed to buy two kilos of gold coins for 12 lakh rupees.
He arranged the money from his savings and even borrowed loan to pay the money and bought the gold.After getting the gold coins he realized that it was fake.
While he was trying to contact Ramesh,he received a call from Mahboob and Yuvaraj introducing themselves as policemen from RT Nagar and assured to recover the money he lost.
Initially Tabrez was shocked since he did not approached the police,but after meeting the duo he was convinced and agreed to get their help .
The duo along with Tabrez went to Davanagere and met their colleague identified as Maruthi,a constable who assured to help them to recover the amount.
As per the deal Maruthi said that out of the total loss of rupees 12 lakh he could recover only rupees 8 lakh and handed over the cash on April 29 .
The accused later took the cut from Tabrez for helping him to get the money and returned only 4.5 lakh rupees.
Initially Tabrez agreed to get the whatever money he could, but after discussing the issue with family and friends he realized that he had been cheated and approached the police .
The police arrested Maruthi,a suspended police constable from Davanagere SP office,Maruthi had history of many cases and a departmental inquiry is pending against him,the officer,said .
The CCB officials are now further investigating to ascertain possible criminal background of the arrested policemen.The police are yet to get clarity on whether the whole “gold coin cheating “was a plot by the accused,a senior police officer, probing the case, said .
