Don’t get CONNED

Don’t get CONNED
Ambarish B tells us the ways by which tricksters divert people’s attention to rob them


Watch your step. With conmen and tricksters devising novel methods to cheat people, there’s no other way out. Don’t fear just chain-snatchers or those who might rob you at knifepoint or gunpoint. Robbery is now a more sophisticated affair. So, be on the lookout for those who can momentarily earn your trust or distract your attention so that they can make away with your valuables. These conmen typically do not pursue an individual over days before making him their target. Rather, they try to size up a person within minutes, if not seconds, while he is busy at an ATM, a temple or a bank branch. They could divert your attention towards a Rs 10 note, offer kumkum as prasadam or even pose as policemen.
SAFETY CLAUSE
Conmen target elderly citizens coming out of the temple, post office or bank and start a conversation saying that they were police in mufti. Once the conmen are convinced the victim has fallen prey, they would advise them to take off the jewellery. Wrapping the jewellery in a piece of cloth, miscreants advise her to open it only after reaching home.
Indiramma (74), a resident of Tyagaraj Nagar, was walking to the State Bank of Mysore branch in Basavanagudi when a man accosted her. He told her that the area was not safe and advised her to take off her gold chain. The man even helped her wrap the chain in a piece of paper and sent her. Only when Indiramma got back home did she realise that the chain worth Rs 40,000 was missing, and that the paper contained small pebbles.
SOME ALERTS
No matter who advises you, don’t take off your jewellery. Don’t get carried away by fake policemen and devotees. In railway stations and inside compartments, don’t accept food from strangers. While travelling in a bus, don’t leave your luggage with strangers. Be cautious about the person sitting next to you, don’t get too friendly and let out personal information. For a few bits of currency, don’t lose big money. Take special precautions while coming out of a bank or post office afterwithdrawing money. It is advisable not to withdraw money from ATMs at night. Don’t count money in public after withdrawing cash from ATMs.
ambarish.bhat@timesgroup.com


PENNY WISE, POUND FOOLISH
A gang of two members waits for its victim. One approaches their victim, the other watches closely. Dropping a currency note or two of Rs 50 or Rs 100, the conman attracts the attention of the victim. When the victim is distracted, the other conman snatches the cash bag and runs away.
A few months ago, Mirza Ahmed Aga, a retired engineer, was waiting for his cousin in his car in the Ashoknagar police station area. A man approached him with a few Rs 10 notes asking if they were his. Mirza came out of the car and picked up the notes, only to lose Rs 30 lakh. Mirza was to use the money to buy a site in the city. The case was registered in Ashoknagar police limits and a search is still on for the con men.



LABORATORY SPECIMENS
These conmen look for women patients wearing jewellery and lead them to a room, on the pretext of taking an X-ray. They ask the victims to take off their jewellery, and wrap it in a cloth, and keep it on the table. While the woman waits for a X-ray technician, the conmen vanish with the jewellery.
At least seven cases have been registered in Wilson Garden and Shivajinagar police limits. An organized gang claiming to be doctors operates inside the private and government hospitals and cheats women, at times even men, of their valuables.
Umesh Dhagat was approached by a man dressed as an attender at a private hospital on Infantry Road. Asking the victim to go to the X-ray room, the conman asked him to remove his jewellery. After the X-ray Dhagat realised that he had made a big mistake.


MODUS OPERANDI
Diverting attention and stealing cash
Offering prasadam laced with sedatives
Diverting attention by banging your car and stealing your mobile
Posing as policemen and making elderly women part with jewellery
Posing as attenders at hospitals, and disappearing with patients’ jewellery
Well-dressed people in Volvo buses stealing baggage placed on the rack



DIRTY TRICKS
Conmen follow their victim from a bank or ATM. When the victim stops at some place, one of them throws some dirt on his clothes and advises the victim to clean it. When the victim is busy rubbing the dirt off his clothes, the conmen snatch the bag which has his money and run away.
Women, too, are part of such gangs. Studying people emerging from banks, they follow them and throw dirt on their clothes. In Chandra Layout, a retired bank employee, returning home after withdrawing cash, was stopped at a shop. A girl said that his shirt had some dirt.
The victim took time cleaning his shirt, by which time a gang member forced open his scooter box and made away with the cash.


IN THE NAME OF GOD
Two men wait for gullible victims, mostly elderly women, and say that they want to open a jewellery shop. They seek the blessings of the women and urge them to part with jewellery to perform pooja at the feet of the Lord. They wrap the valuables in a piece of paper, but after the pooja return another similar-looking packet. It is only after a while that the victims realize they have been conned.
There were at least 10 such cases in Bangalore on Varamahalakshmi Vrutha day, which falls in September. Just a stone’s throw away from the High Grounds police station two men duped a woman in a temple. The men said they wanted to start a jewellery shop in Chickpet. Later, they wrapped the jewellery of the victim, a middle-aged woman, in a Rs 500 note, and went inside the temple to keep it at the feet of the idol. Returning the jewellery, wrapped in another piece of paper, the tricksters vanish. What they returned was a handful of pebbles.


WHAT THE POLICE SAY
Despite alerting citizens about tricksters near banks, such incidents do take place. We have fixed posters in banks alerting citizens about this. Somehow, the alert doesn’t seem to have worked.
Except in ‘cash attention diversion’ in all other methods, victims realize the loss after they reach home. This shows the ability of conmen to convince victims and earn their trust through their communication skills. We wish elderly citizens would turn up at the police-public meets.
Ramjinagar and Malur gangs were notorious for their methods of deception. Now, tricksters from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar are also into this. After the offence, they park their motorcycles at the Majestic bus-stand and return to their respective hometowns.
ALOK KUMAR
DCP, BANGALORE SOUTH