FIA busted a gang of extortionists

Lahore: The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has busted a gang involved in extortion of millions of rupees from citizens on the pretext of online forex trading.

A citizen, Mohsin Raza, Director, Seagullpak Logistics, lodged a complaint with the FIA that the accused, Shahzad Ali, a resident of Lahore and purported country head of the Matt Capital company in Islamabad, had extorted an amount of Rs 0.9 million from him in the name of forex trading and was neither returning his amount nor paying him the profits.

The Cyber Crime Circle of the agency raided an office in Sector I-9 and arrested Shahzad Ali. The raiding party also seized two laptops used by the accused for the illegal forex trading business, several visiting cards and a vehicle.

The forensic analysis of the data recovered from the seized laptops confirmed that the accused was running an illegal forex trading business using the dummy software of Matt Capital with website www.mattcapital.com, without permission from any government department or affiliation with any authority concerned.

The arrested accused confessed before the investigators that dozens of citizens had invested amount in millions with him in the hope of doubling, tripling or even quadrupling their money. He said one Tayyab Tariq Akram, also a resident of Lahore, was the leader of their gang who would sit at Lahore office and would see the operational affairs of the company.

The FIA has registered a case against Shahzad Ali and Tayyab Tariq Akram under section 36, 37 of ETO-2002 and sections 406, 420, 468, 471 & 109 of PPC and sealed their offices in Islamabad and Lahore.

The bail application of Shahzad Ali was rejected first by the civil court and then by the Sessions court in Islamabad and he is in the lockup on judicial remand. Tayyab Tariq Akram is absconding after cancellation of his pre-arrest bail by the Sessions Court and the FIA is raiding to arrest him.