The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Church father arrested for online fraud

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Thursday, Jun 30, 2011
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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Church father arrested for online fraud

Staff Reporter

Creates email IDs, Facebook account in the name of Medak Church Bishop

Accused sends emails to church's headquarters in USA, gets Bishop's trip cancelled
Posts content abusing other Bishops in Facebook account created in the Bishop's name

HYDERABAD: The police on Wednesday arrested a church father, G. Suresh Kumar of Marredpally, on the charge of creating a Facebook account in the name of the Medak Diocese Church's Bishop, T.S. Kanaka Prasad, and posting objectionable content on it.

Kumar was also accused of getting the tour of the Bishop to America cancelled by creating e-mail IDs in his name and sending emails to the church's head office in America stating that he was unable to participate in the tour.

The Bishop approached the Cyber Crime wing of Hyderabad Central Crime Station in the first week of June complaining that someone created e-mail accounts in his name with Yahoo and Hotmail and also an account with the Facebook. Using these e-mail accounts, the accused sent emails to the church's headquarters in America in the Bishop's name.

“The Bishop made arrangements for the foreign trip but it got cancelled based on the emails sent in his name stating that he was not able to attend due to some reasons,” the Cyber Crime Inspector, G. Venkatesham, said.

The accused had sent an email to one person in the Bishop's name seeking 3,000 dollars for some work.

Abusive content

He posted content abusing other church Bishops and heads in the Facebook account created in T.S. Kanaka Prasad's name. Police tracked the Internet Protocol address of the emails to the house of Kumar in Marredpally.

He had admitted to have sent some emails from Internet cafes in that locality.

Suspended

“Kumar was suspended for not taking up the duties after he was transferred from a city church to Medak. He bore grudge against the bishop believing that the latter was responsible for his transfer,” the Inspector explained.

The church father appealed to the Church of South India office in Chennai for revoking his suspension and tried to malign the Bishop while his appeal was pending, the police said.

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