Posing as romantic prospects on a dating app, a gang in Kerala manipulated and extorted hundreds of LGBTQ+ people, preying on their trust--until police untangled their cruel scam.

Kerala police have busted a four-member gang who extorted lakhs of rupees from hundreds of people, mostly from the LGBTQ+ community, after luring them through the dating app Grindr.

Grindr is a location-based social networking and online dating application for gay, bisexual, queer, and transgender people.

The accused landed in police custody recently when one of the victims lodged a complaint with local police alleging that they had extorted his gold chain and ring, worth two and a half sovereigns, and later abandoned him in a deserted place in nearby Palode.

According to Venjaramoodu police, the gang had been indulging in fraud, targeting mainly gay, homosexual, and transgender people, but it was the first time that a person came up with a formal complaint against them.

"All four accused were local youth aged between 18 and 24 years. The mastermind was Sudheer, a native of Chithara here," a senior police officer said on Wednesday.

The co-accused were Mohammed Salman (19), Ashiq (19) and Sajith (18), he said.

The complainant came into contact with the accused after downloading the Grindr app recently, and they decided to meet on Venjaramoodu-Attingal Road on August 7.

As per the modus operandi of the gang, the first or second accused would spend time with the person whom they lured inside a car in an empty area of the meeting place.

The third or fourth accused would appear as strangers, get into the car, drive away at high speed, and rob the victim, the officer said.

The victim was also threatened and beaten up before being robbed of his gold ornaments and abandoned in the deserted area, he said.

Even the complainant initially believed that it was a highway robbery, police said, adding that a detailed investigation brought out the truth later.

"As the accused deleted the entire data in the complainant's phone through a factory reset, there was no clue to reach them. We later retrieved the entire chat through the app with the help of the cyber forensic wing," the police officer detailed.

The accused were suspected to have extorted lakhs of rupees from hundreds of people, but no one was ready to lodge a complaint, police said.

"We examined the mobile phone chats and Google Pay transactions of the first accused and identified several such victims. They admitted that they had lost money, but none of them were ready to lodge a complaint because of their social status," the officer added.

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