Bollywood, Hollywood stars names linked to Dubai property scam

DUBAI - The names of Bollywood actress Minissha Lamba and Hollywood movie star Tara Reid have been used in a property scam in the United Arab Emirates to fleece investors of more than nine million dirhams.

Emirati businessman Ahmad Al Falasi and 11 other investors are locked in a legal battle against four Indians who allegedly swindled them out of 9.3 million dirhams using names of Minissha Lamba and Tara Reid.

Dubai’s Al Falasi said he was swayed by the legitimate-sounding lies told by the men behind the Santorini Development, a Greek-style cluster of apartments, villas and hotels on man-made Al Marjan Island off Ras Al Khaimah.

The men claimed that the two celebrities were looking to buy property on Santorini development, due to be finished this year. Today, however, the development remains nothing more than 463,321 square feet of barren desert, Gulf News reports.

Stallion Properties owner Ankur Mehta, along with partners Sosheeta Phillip Desay, Sanjay Jayantilal Mehta and Naresh Mehta, designed glossy material promoting the 560-unit development.

Suspicion set in for some investors around February last year when the building had yet to start. They learnt that the development was built on broken promises and they didn’t even own the plots of land for which they were making progress payments.

Three of the men behind Stallion Properties - Sanjay Jayantilal Mehta, Naresh Mehta and Ankur Mehta - have been convicted and sentenced to jail for three years by the RAK criminal court for seizing money from investors by trickery. (ANI)