Three held for cheating pawn brokerage firm agent

Chennai: Three men have been arrested for cheating a gold loan agent of ₹40 lakh by falsely claiming that they would redeem pledged jewellery from a private bank in T Nagar and re-pledge it at a private pawn brokerage firm.Police identified them as Radhakrishnan, 41, and Deepak, 35, both from Radhapuram in Tirunelveli district, and Hasan Ali, 57, of Broadway in Chennai. The trio was produced before a magistrate court on Wednesday and remanded in judicial custody.According to police, Vijayakumar, 43, of Kolathur, worked as an agent for a private gold jewellery pawn brokerage firm. Through the manager of the firm’s Medavakkam branch, he came into contact with the accused.Investigators said the accused informed Vijayakumar that gold jewellery pledged at a private bank in T Nagar under Radhakrishnan’s name had to be redeemed and later pledged again at a pawn brokerage firm in Medavakkam. Vijayakumar accompanied Radhakrishnan to the bank on May 18 and transferred ₹40.06 lakh into Radhakrishnan’s bank account to redeem the pledged jewels.Police said Radhakrishnan switched off his mobile phone and fled the bank premises soon after receiving the money. Vijayakumar immediately alerted bank officials, who managed to freeze ₹24.06 lakh in the account.However, investigators found that the accused had already transferred the remaining ₹16 lakh to another bank account in Valliyur in Tirunelveli district through a pre-arranged cheque transaction.Based on Vijayakumar’s complaint, the crime wing of the West Mambalam police station registered a case and launched an investigation. A special police team later traced and arrested the three accused.Further investigation is on.