A convicted murderer, a woman and six others sold properties with forged documents, fake stamp papers and bogus seals of sub-registrar officials, according to police.
Yelahanka New Town police arrested Pradeep alias ‘Poison’ Pradeep of Attur Layout, Dharmalingam S of Chikka Bommasandra, Manjunath K, Yarab alias Abdul Rab, Y R Manjunatha, 51, all three residents of Yelahanka New Town, Abdul Ghani, 67, of Bhadrappa Layout, Shabhana Bhanu, 42, of RT Nagar, and Ramaiah alias Auto Ramaiah, a convicted murderer released from prison two years ago.
Police seized 2,130 stamp papers, 17 seals and a typewriter from the arrested people.
The scam came to light when the gang sold a 2,400-square foot residential property belonging to Dr Prashanth Reddy to someone.
Reddy, a doctor settled in the US, recently learnt that miscreants have sold his property with forged documents. His father Jayapratap Reddy lodged a police complaint.
Scam to fund gambling
Pradeep, the kingpin who is a real estate broker, would find residential plots and study their owners. When he learns that the owners live abroad or in a far-off place, he would forge the documents and sell them off by identifying strangers as landowners.
The eight people arrested allegedly helped him create fake documents and found prospective buyers. Pradeep used the money earned from the scam to fund his gambling habits. He became friends with Ramaiah and borrowed money from him. When Ramaiah insisted on getting his money back, Pradeep sold a real-estate property to return what he owed the murder convict.
Pradeep is known among his friends as ‘Poison’ Pradeep since he was catching poison snakes in the past.
A senior police officer said the gang had been involved in the scam since 2018 and sold residential sites.
Police have detected six cases against the gang.
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