Gang of fake cops targeting women with jewels is back in Lucknow

TNN / Updated: Jun 27, 2023, 12:34 IST

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In the third such incident in last one week, a woman was conned of her ornaments by miscreants who impersonated as cops and intimidated her in the name of checking drive in view of a murder, in posh Gomtinagar area on Monday.

Gang of fake cops targeting women with jewels is back in Lucknow

Image used for representative purpose only

LUCKNOW: In the third such incident in last one week, a woman was conned of her ornaments by miscreants who impersonated as cops and intimidated her in the name of checking drive in view of a murder, in posh Gomtinagar area on Monday.

Last year, a gang was active in the city which posed as crime branch officials and targeted women with their ornaments.The police had busted the gang after which there was a lull in such cases, but the gang is back, it seems.

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A similar gang was busted by a special unt of the Lucknow police last year in November. The police can do the same again. In fact, the commissionerate can constitute a permanent special unit to crack crimes that are of similar nature or appear to be handiwork of a gang. At present such cases are handled by the police station where they occur respectively, hence a dedicated unit will save both time and effort.

In the Monday incident, Poonam Singh was returning from a doctor’s clinic in Vivek Khand when near Manoj Pandey crossing around 12.30 pm two men on bike intercepted her and told her that a woman had been murdered and that the policemen were conducting checking and a ban had been ordered on wearing of gold ornaments and they gave a wrapper to put all the jewels in it. Following their instructions, Poonam took off all her ornaments and put it in the wrapper. However, when she reached home, she found bricks wrapped in it.

Similarly, on June 22, an unidentified man had conned one Kiran Yadav of her ornaments by intimidating her in the name of police checking in Mahanagar. Kiran was returning to her home in Nishatganj when the miscreant intercepted her. “The imposter did not allow me to move without putting on the ornaments. I was scared and could not unchain the gold chain and he helped me in taking it off. He then took the ornaments in his hand and gave them back to me after wrapping them,” she told police.
The victim said when she opened the sachet it was filled with small pieces of stones.
Similar incident had taken place with another woman in the Naka area on June 20. On June 11 and 12 also, two women were conned in similar manner.
Additional DCP, East Zone, Syed Abbas Ali said that they are working on such cases in their zone. “The suspects seem to be in their 40s and use a normal bike and not a sports bike. They only target elderly women going in lonely stretches. They have intensified patrolling of cops on bikes,” he said.

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