24 April,2019 01:42 PM IST | | Faizan Khan
Pic courtesy/Faizan Khan
The Mumbai crime branch arrested a 29-year-old man from Bandra for allegedly blackmailing a TV actress in order to extort money from her. The accused identified as Siddharth Sarvoday (29) allegedly morphed the victim's photographs and then threatened to post them online.
The accused introduced himself as a casting director on social media and contacted several struggling actresses and models. After getting access to their profile pictures, he morphed them and then blackmailed the victims. The crime came to light after the accused threatened a TV actress that he would share her morphed photographs on social media sites and then demanded Rs 1 lakh from her. Following which, a complaint was registered by the actress with the Versova police station. The crime branch's Unit 9 conducted a parallel investigation and arrested Sarvoday after 12 days.
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An officer from the crime branch stated, "The accused did not complete his 10th grade but he is well-versed with technology. He kept changing his locations by switching off his cellphone in order to avoid an arrest and misguide the investigating team. We finally managed to arrest him from Bandra with the help of some evidence against him."
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According to the senior PI of Unit 09 Mahesh Desai, "He confessed that he used the same modus operandi to blackmail many struggling actresses and models and based on his statement seven victims have been identified. The process of registering more FIRs against him in other police stations is underway." The accused has been arrested under section 385, 509, 506 of IPC and relevant sections of IT act. Further investigation is underway."
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