The US police have arrested seven Bangladeshis for swindling $8 million out of 15 banks in New York with forged cheques.
They had run this racket for the past three and a half years, police said.
Police have launched a manhunt to nab five other members of the cartel.
The seven Bangladeshis have been arrested from New York and Georgia.
Sayeed Al Hassan was arrested from an Emirates Airways flight at John F Kennedy Airport on Nov 21. He was earlier expelled from the US in connection with another crime.
The six others arrestees are Zaman Mahbub aka Faisal aka Mahbubzzaman, Md Golam Azam aka Sohag aka Fayez Ahmed Khan aka Kamal Pasha, Md Khalil aka Robin aka Awal Hassan, Md Nazrul Islam, AKM Golam Hossain aka Mohammad Uddin aka Sariyi Amebi oka Pankha aka James Palam aka Mohammad Sheikh Islam and Dipak Rana aka Noor Hossain.
They had managed to pull off the fraud by taking on different alias, police said.
The six of the seven arrested have pleaded guilty on being produced before the Federal Court. The court ordered all of them to jail.
The fraudsters took telephone, gas and power connections by using fake ID cards, driving licences, social security numbers, the case details revealed.
They opened accounts in 15 banks in fake names by producing fake documents. They also withdrew money by placing bogus cheques.
The US police had arrested 14 Bangladeshis on a number of charges including real estate and credit card forgeries several years ago.
Two of them fled after securing bail. The rest were sentenced to various terms.
Source: bdnews24
