An engineering consultant from Powai was scammed into losing nearly Rs 7 crore over three years in a commodity trading scheme

MUMBAI: The latest victim to lose crores to cyber fraud is an engineering consultant attached to a multinational. The 51-year-old was duped of nearly Rs 7 crore in a commodity trading scam over three years.
The fraud took off when the Powai resident first spotted a popup advertisement about commodity trading on Aug 1, 2021. When he began trading, he was asked to send money in the form of cryptocurrency. The complainant opened crypto accounts on two well-known exchanges to fulfil the accused’s demands. The fraud was committed between Aug 2021 and Dec 2024. He approached the cyber police on Jan 30 while an FIR was registered on Feb 27 at the west region cyber police station, located in BKC.
The complainant told the police he received an online popup of Wallstreets.com while working from home. To get more information on the said website, he submitted his personal details, email ID, and passport details. After the ‘registration’, one Leo, posing as the representative of Wallstreets.com, contacted him through WhatsApp and gave him information about the “company” and lured him with high returns. The accused asked the complainant to pay $1,000 to start trading. The complainant told police that he inquired about Wallstreets.com online and found information about the said company. He paid Rs 74,500 through a payment gateway. He then started trading on Wallstreets.com, and his account balance appeared in US dollars.
One Aryan Reddy contacted the complainant through WhatsApp and guided him on how to trade on the said website. The complainant told police when the balance on the above account decreased, he tried to withdraw money from it but failed. On Feb 23, 2022, he received an email from another person, Leo Maxwell, who stated the complainant initially made a profit of $55,236 and was credited to his trading account. He said if the complainant wanted the money, he would have to pay a tax of $14,000. Maxwell asked him to pay this tax in cryptocurrency. The complainant followed the instructions. Maxwell then sent $2,000 to the complainant’s crypto wallet address.
Another person, Krish, contacted the complainant and said he was calling from the same company and Maxwell fraudulently transferred the complainant’s money. Krish said he would help withdraw the complainant’s money and he would have to pay $100,000. The complainant told him he did not have that much money. After negotiation, the amount was brought down to $60,000. Hoping the account would be opened, the complainant sent $60,000 from his wallet to the wallet address given by Krish.
One Gilbert, Krish’s “boss”, then contacted the complainant through WhatsApp and said he would have to pay tax to get the money back. In overthree years, the complainant sent a total of around Rs 6.8 crore to the accused. Later, when the complainant contacted Gilbert’s number, a woman who identified herself as Gilbert’s wife said he had died. This was when the complainant got suspicious.