NRI charged with bank fraud in US

The United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested a California-based man of Indian origin on charges of defrauding Wells Fargo Bank of $ 500,000 in September 2004, official sources said.

Jaswinder Singh Sekhon, 27, now a Finnish national, used 200 stolen credit card numbers to cheat the bank.

Using the stolen numbers, Sekhon allegedly funneled purchases made on these cards to two dummy companies of his -- H&M Tobacco and H&M Indian Music, ICE found during its investigations launched in October 2004.

Further investigations revealed that Sekhon had plans to defraud two other banks -- Bank of America and US Bank -- using the stolen card numbers, Mark Wollman, ICE deputy special agent in charge, said.

According to documents presented to the Oakland office of the US Attorney for California, Sekhon planned to use these numbers to make charges payable to the checking account of a company -- Sakshi Small Transportation -- which he controlled.

The accused is currently charged with one count of bank fraud, the sources said.