A man from Ahmedabad was among four people arrested by the Special Cell of Delhi Police for defrauding US citizens out of more than $20 million through a ‘con call centre’ racket.
Vatsal Mehta, 28, was detained by Delhi police after reportedly serving as the organization's boss and overseeing the operation of the contact centrering in Uganda. Mehta and 21 other people were apprehended by authorities in August 2018 in the Lasudia neighbourhood of Indore, MP, for defrauding Americans via a call centre.
“Delhi police in coordination with the FBI legal attache and Interpol have arrested four men for allegedly cheating US citizens out of more than $20 million by running scam call centres,” officials said. Apart from Mehta, the other accused were Parth Armarkar (28), Deepak Arora (45) and Prashant Kumar (45).
Police said the accused operated call centres in Uganda and several parts of India, including Delhi.
H S Dhaliwal, the special commissioner of police (special cell), claimed that his team learned of the operation of call centres run by international cyber criminals based in India, the US, and Uganda that defrauded US citizens by impersonating as representatives of the Internal Revenue Service, the Social Security Administration, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and other US agencies through confidential sources including the FBI and Interpol.
One of the accused, Armarkar, he said, impersonated Uttam Dhillon, who had served as the acting administrator of the US Drug Enforcement Administration and as the director of Interpol Washington.