CID SIT raids residences, offices of four former CCB officials in bitcoin case

SIT raids nine places in Bengaluru, arrests four police officials & two people for fabricating documents & accessing e-wallets of prime accused. Raids also conducted at offices of cyber security experts. Two more arrested in e-procurement website hacking case; total arrests 21. Probe reveals accused took Sriki into custody for investigations but to access his account illegally.

The Special Investigation Team (SIT) of the CID probing the bitcoin case, led by ADGP Manish Kharbikar, on Saturday, conducted a series of raids on the houses of Central Crime Branch (CCB) officials and two people who allegedly fabricated the seized documents and accessed the e-wallets of the prime accused Sriki for personal gain.

A team of officials raided nine places belonging to four police officials and two people, including DySP Sridhar Pojar, Inspectors Prashanth Babu, Chandradhar and Lakshikath, in different locations and recovered four laptops, eight mobile phones, two NAS (network attached storage) devices, 10 hard drives, five pen drives, a memory card and other relevant documents.

The SIT officials had sought the details of the hacking and the laptops the accused officials seized from Sriki for investigations. However, the accused allegedly refused to cooperate with the investigations and failed to hand over the seized electronic gadgets, following which the SIT officials carried out the raid, sources said.

Investigations by the SIT officials revealed that the accused officials had taken Sriki into custody for investigations but taken him into the offices of private cyber security experts for questioning and to get access to his account to recover the bitcoins, which is illegal. The SIT officials also raided the offices of the cyber security experts, identified as Santosh and Gagan Jain, who owned firms that deal with cyber forensics and darknet investigation and recovered a considerable amount of material about the case.

Meanwhile, the SIT, who were also probing the e-procurement website hacking case, arrested two more persons allegedly involved in laundering the proceeds of the money stolen after hacking into the state government e portal in 2019. 

With the arrest of Nitiin Meshram and Darshith Patel, the total number of arrests has reached 21, said a senior police officer. The team based on their information is conducting search operations in several places in Koramangala and Bommanahalli.

On Friday, the SIT team arrested a farmer, Harwinder Singh of Kapurthala in Punjab, for similar charges of money laundering from the proceeds of the e-procurement portal of the Karnataka government.