Blackmailing through 'love'

Love is not what they seek; they seek only money.

They trap men eager for the company of lonely women by taking steamy photos showing them in compromising positions.

For this, they sometimes pose as students, models, and even as expatriates’ wives.

Such fraudsters have been active in Chittagong City for some time.

So far, they had known about four such rings, said Babul Akter, Deputy Commissioner at Chittagong Metropolitan Detective and Criminal Intelligence Branch (DB).

Four members of one such imposters’ ring were arrested at Chandgaon, a city neighbourhood, on Thursday, he said.

They are Kulsum Akter alias Tania, 27, her husband Munna Kamal, 36, Md Robi, 22, and Abdus Sattar, 28.

“We were able to arrest them as we were investigating several such complaints,” senior police officer Babul told bdnews24.com.

“This ring consists of several men and women. They mainly target people from different professions, specially bankers.”

“The male members collect the mobile phone numbers of their possible targets, passing on the numbers of the female members.”

The women get in touch with these people, strike up 'friendship' and lure them into a secret rendezvous. There, they have photos taken of their men friends in compromising positions and used them to extort money”

Babul said, “The arrested persons confessed during interrogation that around 20 members of four gangs were active in the city.”

Kulsuma confessed to the police that she phoned various persons, posing as an expatriate's wife.

“She told them she lived alone with her four-year old girl and even made the child talk to the person on the other end to make everything seem convincing,” said the police

Police said Munna had confessed to them that, though he drove three-wheelers, he had been making good money for some years by trapping people in such liaisons with his wife Kulsuma and niece Nuruddin.

Robi had himself been a victim three years ago but later joined the gang, he confessed to the police.

Efforts were on, the senior police officer said, to arrest others.