Kidnapping: Girls as bait to entice victims
KANPUR: Here's a word of caution for the rich, if the recent incidents of kidnapping in and around the city is any indication, where kidnappers had roped in girls'in their gangs to trap their prey.
An increasing number of criminals operating in the region are kidnapping people with the help of `girls' instead of indulging directly.
According to the police, the modus-operandi of the criminals has also changed. They are now finding it more easier to trap their prey with the help of women recruits.
"Investigations into two such cases reported from the city is a warning sign for rich persons," said a police official. Giving inputs that young women are being used to trap victims, he said that in the case of kidnapping of a tannery owner's son some time back from Chakeri area, investigations revealed that the kidnappers had used a girl named Sapna as a bait to call the victim identified as Noor at a place where they could kidnap him without much problem.
On the day of the kidnapping, a senior gang member had asked five kidnappers from Banda to reach Rama Devi crossing in Kanpur. On the other side, he had asked Sapna to call Noor and take him to the Rama Devi crossing on the pretext of a lift. When Noor had reached the site, he was taken at gunpoint and held hostage. On August 6, 2009, Noor was handed over to Sunder Lal gang in Khamarahiya jungles.
According to the arrested persons, the gang had only released Noor after collecting Rs 5 lakh as ransom.
"Often wealthy people have weakness for women. The women lure such victims on the pretext of `meeting' and `friendship'. The girls called them to reach secluded place from where they are trapped.
Similarly, 19-year-old Mridul, kidnapped six days ago from Prithvidabad village in Qayamganj tehsil of Farrukhabad district, was trapped by a woman Momina. The victim had told the police that he going somewhere on July 24, when Momina called him up on his cell phone and expressed her `desire' to meet him at a lonely place. When Mridul reached at the "lonely" place, he was overpowered by kidnappers who took him to an unknown place.
The kidnapping industry is lucrative, a police official said, adding that its a `low-risk, huge-return' crime.
Police investigations into various kidnapping cases in the recent past have revealed the involvement of a group of persons at different stages. "The gang include persons who target the prey, then gang members who accomplish the task by kidnapping the prey, again another lot who cook and serve food, the ones who offer shelter to the victim, the ones who have a hold in the locality where the victim is held captive till the payment of ransom and in latest cases, the women who serve as bait," the officer added.
According to another senior police official, the gang members often collect details about the victims financial status and his/her daily movement before committing the crime.
"The gangs pay a lion's share of the booty to the `agents' for `negotiating' the amount with the family members of the victim," another police officer said. The rest is shared by the others who commit the crime.
There was one such gang in the ravines, which used to force the villagers to do the daily chores of the gang members and the kidnapped victims and prepare sumptuous dishes for them.
"One Om Prakash and his nephew Bablu was kidnapped under Amrahat police station in Kanpur Dehat for this task only by the Mohar Singh gang," said another police official.
Incidentally, police teams from places like Delhi and Bihar have come to the city in the past few months in search of victims and their kidnappers. Not long ago, GRP Delhi sleuths had rescued a son of a Delhi-based dairy owner from the clutches of kidnappers at Kanpur Central railway station.
(Read more: Kidnapping: Girls as bait to entice victims - Kanpur - City - The Times of India http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kanpur/Kidnapping-Girls-as-bait-to-entice-victims/articleshow/6249235.cms#ixzz0vi5gGOLc)
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