Indian national in US gets 5 years jail for call centre fraud
Darpan News Desk IANS, 09 Nov, 2022 12:12 PM
New York, Nov 9 (IANS) Waseem Maknojiya, a 38 year-old Indian national, has been sentenced to five years in prison by a Texas court for committing mail fraud and duping customers via Indian call centres.
Maknojiya, who was illegally residing in Houston, had pleaded guilty on September 13, 2021, a press statement by the US Attorney's Office in the Southern District of Texas said.
On Tuesday, US District Judge Lynn N. Hughes ordered Maknojiya to serve 60 months in federal prison.
Not an American citizen, he is expected to face removal proceedings following his imprisonment.
Between April and October 2019, Maknojiya was involved in a telemarketing scheme via Indian call centres to extort money from victims in the US.
He acted as a runner in these schemes, using aliases and fake identification documents to pick up more than 70 parcels containing cash the scheme's victims had mailed, the press release stated.
One common script used in the scheme involved coercing victims into believing federal agents were investigating them.
The "agent" on the phone would convince the victim the only way to clear his or her name from investigation was to send cash in a parcel shipped through FedEx to a name and address they provided.
Runners in the US like Maknojiya would then pick up the parcels.
At the time of his plea, he agreed to pay restitution to the scheme's identified victims.
He will remain in custody pending transfer to a US Bureau of Prisons facility to be determined in the near future.
Jack Dorsey, the maverick behind making Twitter the world's go-to social platform to rant, laud, troll or play simple catch up, is moving on. Indian-American Parag Agrawal, Twitter @paraga, is the new CEO, with immediate effect, Dorsey announced.
Retailers are expected to usher in the unofficial start to the holiday shopping season Friday with bigger crowds than last year in a closer step toward normalcy. But the fallout from the pandemic continues to weigh on businesses and shoppers' minds.
Maybe. As of noon Friday, travelers arriving in the U.K. from South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, Lesotho, Eswatini and Zimbabwe will have to self-isolate for 10 days. European Union nations also moved quickly on Friday to try to stop air travel from southern Africa.
His family has appealed to the Indian government to help in bringing his body home. According to delayed information reaching his family members, Mandali Shekhar (28) died when a speeding car hit him at Ellicott City in Maryland state on November 19.
At least five people were killed and more than 40 others injured after a vehicle rammed into a crowd at an annual holiday parade in Waukesha, a city in the US state of Wisconsin, authorities said on Monday.
Satveer Singh, an Indian citizen serving as Head Granthi at Gurdwara Karte Parwan, Kabul, for the past twenty one years and Sorjit Singh, Afghan Citizen hailing from Khost Province and caretaker of Gurdwara situated there, were evacuated on Thursday.
