Gang Involved in ATM Fraud Busted : Two Arrested

With the arrest of two accused persons namely (1) Ranjeet Sahani, aged 25 years s/o Trilok Sahani r/o H No. 443/1, New Basti Devli Village, Delhi and (2) Subhash Thakur, aged 29 years s/o Ram Narayan Thakur r/o A-159, Shiv Vihar, West Vikas Nagar, Uttam Nagar, Delhi, the staff of Police Station Govind Puri has solved a cheating case in which cash Rs. 15,000/- was fraudulently withdrawn from the account of complainant through ATM. 

Complainant Kashmir Singh s/o Late Jeevat Singh stated that on 10.01.2015 at around 12 noon, he went to ATM of a renowned bank situated at Madya Marg, Tuglakabad Extension, Delhi to withdraw cash. While he entered the ATM booth, he found that one person was already present inside the booth. There were three ATMs in the booth. He tried to withdraw money from one of the ATMs in the booth but could not succeed. Then he proceeded to withdraw money from the ATM booth of another bank but again failed. He again tried on the previous ATM booth where now two persons were present. The moment he swapped the card in the machine, one of the persons present in the booth on the pretext of helping him took his ATM card but he too failed to withdraw cash consequently the complainant left the ATM booth. After some time, he received a SMS that Rs. 15,000/- have been debited from his account. It was alleged by the complainant that the two persons present in the ATM booth had cheated him by some trick and maneuvering the ATM. Consequently, a case vide FIR No. 513/2013 u/s 420 IPC was registered at Police Station Govindpuri and investigation was taken up.

A team led by Inspr. Sunil Kumar SHO/Govindpuri comprising of SI Abhishek Singh, HC Kunji Lal, Ct. Kapil Dev and Ct. Rajesh was constituted under the supervision of Shri Jasbir Singh ACP/Kalkaji.

During investigation, CCTV footage of the ATM booth was taken and photographs of alleged persons were developed and circulated among large number of people. Vigil around various ATM booths was enhanced. After painstaking efforts, on 16.04.2015 the team finally zeroed in on two persons and apprehended them while they were present in the same ATM booth from where the complainant was cheated. They were identified as (1) Ranjeet Sahani r/o New Basti Dewli Village, Delhi and (2) Subhash Thakur r/o West Vikas Nagar, Uttam Nagar, Delhi.

During interrogation, they disclosed that they used to commit crime in the ATM booths where two or more machines were installed. Besides, they either used to jam the ‘Cancel’ button by applying feviquick on the button or used to temporarily fix the ‘Star’ or ‘Hash’ button with the help of small chips and allpins. As a result the ATM machine used to read the card but would not function. Once the user failed to withdraw cash from tempered ATM machine, the person present in ATM machine would offer him help and stealthily see his PIN number. The moment user leave the booth after using machine, they remove the chip fixed at ‘star’ or ‘hash’ button and after inserting the PIN code, used to withdraw cash.

One Honda City car and one Bullet motorcycle which they had purchased from the cheated money, have also been recovered.

PROFILE

1.   Accused Ranjeet Sahani is residing in a rented house at New Basti, Devli Village, Delhi. He is graduate and married. His wife is post graduate. He is working as a English speaking teacher in an Institute at Garhi, Delhi. He got attracted towards ATM fraud to earn easy money. He is previously involved in two cases (1) FIR No. 42/13 u/s 364-A IPC PS Sadatpur and (2) FIR No. 295/11 u/s 420/120-B/34 IPC PS Crime Branch, Delhi.

2.   Accused Subhash Thakur is also residing in a rented house at West Vikas Nagar, Uttam Nagar, Delhi. He is graduate and married. His wife is also post graduate. He is preparing for civil services examination. He joined accused Ranjeet about two years ago in committing crime. He is previously involved in case FIR No. 143/13 u/s 380/411 IPC PS Vikas Puri, Delhi.