Smooth operators: Extortionists arrested

They have been extorting money from doctors

KARACHI: The police claim to have busted a gang allegedly involved in extorting money from professionals in the city.

Their arrests were disclosed during a press conference held by the zone West and Central police chief, DIG Feroz Shah, at his office on Monday. There are at least three gangs based in South Africa and one operating from Afghanistan that are making threatening calls to extort millions of rupees from doctors in Karachi.

The members of one gang operating in the city have been arrested. DIG Shah said that the police traced the members of the gang and arrested three of them - Wasif, Rafiq and Faizan- during a raid on a tip-off at their hideout in Khawaja Ajmair Nagri locality, while another gang member, Tufail, was arrested from Jauharabad on the information provided by his already arrested companions. The police claim to have seized computers, extortion slips and weapons from their possession.

"The gang is being run by someone in South Africa, who directed them to threaten and collect extortion money from doctors and pharmaceutical companies in Karachi," DIG Shah explained. "They have extorted millions of rupees and have also killed several doctors in Karachi over refusal to pay extortion money."

He said that they operated under the name of the Lyari gangsters but originally belonged to a political party, adding that the cases against them have been registered.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 4^th, 2015.