Pramesh S Jain
The Central Crime Branch (CCB) has arrested five habitual offenders for allegedly impersonating CCB officers,abducting a gym trainer,and demanding Rs.5 lakh by threatening to implicate him in a fake narcotics case.
The case has been registered at Shankarpura Police Station for offences under Sections 140(3),308(2), 351(2),62 read with 3(5) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).
The victim,a resident of JP Nagar,was allegedly targeted after the accused learnt that he was addicted to drugs.
Posing as CCB officers,they picked him up in a car on the pretext of questioning him in a drug case.
They allegedly assaulted,intimidated,and threatened to book him under the NDPS Act unless he paid Rs.5 lakh.
According to DCP (Crime) Raja Imam Kasim,who supervised the investigation, told reporters the accused are habitual offenders with multiple criminal cases against them.
During the abduction,the gang stopped near a police station, where two of the accused entered the premises on the pretext of making a general enquiry,apparently to convince the victim that they were genuine CCB officers.
After detaining and torturing the victim,the accused released him after obtaining his assurance that he would arrange the ransom money.
The victim subsequently lodged a complaint, prompting the CCB to launch an investigation on Sunday.
In a startling twist,when a CCB officer contacted one of the accused during the probe, the suspect continued to falsely claim that he was a CCB officer.
Using CCTV footage collected from various locations, CCB officers tracked down the accused and arrested them at Rajanukunte on Monday.
The arrested accused have been identified as:
Tirumala V.(28),Yelahanka New Town,Shanth Kumar (44),Vidyaranyapura,Prem Sai (30),Yelahanka,Ranjeeth Rao (31),RT Nagar,Namith alias Abhi (29),RT Nagar.
All five accused have been remanded to judicial custody and efforts are on to track down others involved in the crime who are in the run .
