Extorted Rs 7,00,500 from one woman and Rs 23,00,000 from another; misused private photos of victim; gym owner Gipson Joe arrested

HARIPAD: A gym owner who extorted lakhs from women who came for training was caught by the police. Gipson Joe (35) of Cheppad Manipuzha House who runs a fitness centre on the north side of Haripad Town Hall Junction, was arrested by the Haripad Police from Nedumbassery Airport. He extorted lakhs from women by saying that he was in financial trouble and that he could add them to the gym's partnership if they helped him with money. In the investigation based on the complaint lodged with the Haripad police by two women who were scammed like this, it was learned that he was abroad.

Police arrested Gipson when he returned to Nedumbassery Airport the other day. He took Rs 4,70,000 from the woman who was a complainant, promising to pay a monthly profit of Rs 12,000, and later extorted Rs 7,00,500 in multiple payments, saying that the ownership of the company would be transferred to her name.

The accused met another woman at another fitness centre and repeatedly swindled her. Taking the woman's credit card, Gipson withdrew money without the woman's knowledge and used it to buy gym equipment and extorted Rs 23,00,000. When she asked for the money back, he sent her private photos to her husband, brother and friends over the phone and broke her mentally. The police said that the accused then went abroad.

The accused was arrested by a team comprising SI Sreekumar, CPOs Sajad, Kishore and Pradeep Unnikrishnan on the instructions of Haripad ISHO Abhilash Kumar.