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- Police in Manchester have arrested a 41-year-old Indonesian man on suspicion of wire fraud, identity theft, and conspiracy.
- The arrest was made shortly after a US extradition request, an FBI spokesperson told AFP.
- Authorities allege that Hargobind Tahilramani, nicknamed the ‘Hollywood Con Queen,’ stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from young actors by impersonating female media executives.
- He mimicked the voices of Rupert Murdoch’s former wife Wendi Deng, Lucasfilm boss Kathleen Kennedy and other high-profile media executives.
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A man accused of running a scam to defraud aspiring actors by pretending to be high-profile female executives has been arrested in the UK after the US made an extradition request.
Hargobind Tahilramani, 41, has been dubbed the ‘Hollywood Con Queen’ – a name popularised by a successful podcast series on the fraudulent scheme.
The FBI is accusing Tahilramani of impersonating influential female media executives in an attempt to steal money from actors, film crew, and make-up artists.
He was arrested in central Manchester last week, reports the Hollywood Reporter.
Tahilramani now faces possible extradition to the US.
An FBI spokesperson told news agency AFP: "The defendant has been arrested in the United Kingdom-based on a request for his provisional arrest submitted by the United States with a view towards his extradition."
An investigation into the identity of the 'Hollywood Con Queen' has been ongoing for seven years. On Thursday, the Department of Justice and the FBI unsealed an indictment that revealed that the 41-year-old Indonesian man is the suspect.
He now, if extradited, faces eight federal charges, including wire fraud, conspiracy, and identity theft.
The fraudulent scheme reportedly involved Tahilramani adopting the personas of prominent media executives to convince unsuspecting victims to hand over money.
He mimicked the voices of Rupert Murdoch's former wife Wendi Deng, Lucasfilm boss Kathleen Kennedy and other high-profile media executives, according to documents seen by The Guardian.
The suspected con man reportedly convinced victims of the scam to travel to Indonesia for fictional job opportunities.
They were then tricked into paying Tahilramani and his co-conspirators significant sums for expenses that were never reimbursed, the documents state.
Tahilramani is believed to have duped aspiring actors out of hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The arrests mark the end of a lengthy investigation led by the FBI and assisted by private investigators at K2 Integrity.
The intelligence firm's chief executive, Jules Kroll, said in a statement: "We are proud that our work identifying the individual and amassing an impenetrable amount of evidence formed the basis of law enforcement's case and, at the end of the day, is helping to finally bring the scammer to justice."
The scam has garnered so much public interest that it will now be turned into a book.
HarperCollins has secured the rights to chronicle the long hunt to find the international scammer.