The Ramamurthy Nagar police on Wednesday arrested four Home Guards and a conman masquerading as a journalist for allegedly running an extortion racket. The racket came to light when the owner of a spa and saloon in Jayanthi Nagar main road approached the police with a complaint stating that police had raided his spa on February 26, and extorted ₹1.6 lakh after accusing him of running a prostitution racket.
Based on the complaint, the police tracked down the five men. One of the accused, Syed Kaleem, 28, from RT Nagar, claimed to be a reporter for ‘Custom and excise news portal’. The Home Guards have been identified as Sampangiram, 31, Asif Babujan, 27, Anand Raj, 30, and Vinayaka, 28. The police recovered ₹60,000 cash from them and ₹1 lakh from the bank account that the spa owner had transferred the money to after the raid.
“Investigations revealed that Kaleem, posing as a journalist, would visit small commercial establishments and threaten the owners. He would claim that he had information of their involvement in illegal rackets, and would extort money from them after carrying out fake raids with the help of his associates who were Home Guards,” said a police officer.
The police suspect that the accused may have cheated many people in this manner. “We have taken them into custody for further investigation,” the police officer added.
