Pune, Sep 8: If you think something is too good to be true, chances are that it probably is. A 64-year-old widow from the city learnt this lesson the hard way recently.
The Chatushrungi police have booked a person named Harley Benson, who claimed to be from London, for allegedly duping the elderly woman of Rs 94.5 lakh after promising to marry her. The woman lodged a police complaint on Tuesday.
The suspect had befriended the woman, a resident of Model Colony, off Fergusson College Road on Facebook. Benson and she exchanged cellphone numbers and began sending SMSs and Whatsapp messages to each other in May 2016.
According to police, he professed his love for her a couple of months ago and promised to marry her. Benson won her confidence by claiming that he was willing to relocate to India.
As the woman's daughter is based in the US and her husband died in 2014, she lives alone in the city, police inspector U B Shingade said.
The woman was earlier employed as a teacher in a prominent research institute of the Union government and has now retired. police said.
On July 27 this year, Benson called her up and told her that he was shifting to Pune and was carrying gold and diamonds worth 95,000.
After a couple of days, he called her up again claiming that Indian customs officials had caught him at the Delhi airport and were demanding a fine for the gold and diamonds.
Benson claimed that he was not carrying a large amount of money and requested her to pay the fine.
The complaint said that Benson provided her a few bank account numbers and requested her to deposit money in them. The woman deposited Rs 94.5 lakh in the account numbers provided by him over some period. After receiving the money, he switched off his cellphone number.
Police said that the woman sold a piece of land to pay the money. Police have obtained details of the bank accounts and have launched a manhunt to trace the suspect.
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