CID SIT Closes Cases Against Four Bengaluru Police Officers In Bitcoin Scam
On July 1, the Special Investigation Team (SIT) of the Karnataka CID filed closure reports for cases against four Bengaluru police officers accused of corruption and evidence tampering in a bitcoin scam, after the state government denied permission to prosecute them. The closure reports, known as 'B' reports, were filed in court regarding cases registered at the Cottonpet police station and the Cyber Crime police station in Bengaluru.
The four police officers who will no longer face prosecution are Deputy Superintendent of Police Sridhar Pujar and police inspectors Prashanth Babu, S R Chandradhar, and Lakshmikanthaiah. They were accused of receiving kickbacks from hacker Srikrishna Ramesh, alias Sriki, to dilute hacking cases.
While the cases against the police officers have been closed, the SIT filed a chargesheet against K S Santhosh Kumar, a private cyber expert. Kumar's services had been used by the Bengaluru Central Crime Branch (CCB) in 2020-21 to recover stolen Bitcoins from the hacker.
According to the SIT investigation, Kumar illegally accessed the cryptocurrency wallet of Robin Khandelwal, the hacker’s accountant, and transferred Bitcoin valued at Rs 1.83 lakh to his own crypto wallet.
The controversy dates back to 2020-21 when the CCB arrested Sriki and his associates. In August 2023, the SIT filed an FIR at the Cottonpet police station against unnamed CCB officers for allegedly manipulating electronic devices, including laptops and mobile phones, recovered from Sriki while he was in custody.
A second FIR was registered on January 24, 2024, at the Cyber Crime police station, naming Kumar and the four police officers. The officers and Kumar were arrested by the SIT earlier in 2024 on charges of illegal confinement, breach of trust, and destruction of evidence.
The investigation also revealed multiple procedural lapses by the CCB police, including illegal detention, lack of documentation for computer usage, and providing a laptop worth Rs 60,000 to Sriki to facilitate hacking while in custody.
The CID SIT was established in June 2023 to probe allegations of corruption within the CCB, senior police ranks, and political circles regarding the handling of Sriki's hacking cases between 2019 and 2023.
