Alex Joseph acquired 4 passports from Dubai

The Directorate of Revenue Intelligence(DRI) has found that Alex C Joseph, who was allegedly involved in luxury car smuggling, had procured four fake passports from the Indian Embassy in Dubai.


The Kochi police investigating the case are tracing the people in the Indian Embassy who assisted Alex to get the passports under different names.


According to the police, Alex had close links with several top officials at the embassy and it is believed that the passports were received through these sources.


“We could track down five passports being used by him, of which one was his own. Of the other four, three were issued in the name of Aby John and one in the name of Thomas Mathew.


These passports were issued from the Dubai Embassy in different years.


We are tracing the fake documents submitted by Alex for getting the passports.


The place of residence mentioned in the passports were in Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and New Delhi,” said a  police official.


The DRI officials suspect that Alex had applied for lost passports.



“We had information that he had updated some of the passports from Dubai. He might have applied for the lost passport and thus was able to receive the fake ones,” they said.


The officials added that While he was taken into custody from Hyderabad, Alex introduced himself as Aby John.


“But later when we quizzed him by showing his other passports, he admitted that he possessed other passports too,” the officials said.


Alex was held by the Immigration Department officials in Hyderabad last November while he attempted to flee the country using a fake passport.


  The Hyderabad police had handed over the passport to Tiruvalla police who returned the passport to Alex later. The DRI had earlier issued a look-out notice against him.


 Alex had smuggled luxury cars under different names through various ports, including Kochi, from 1997, disguising them as used cars.


After his arrest, the case was investigated by the Palarivattom police and later it was handed over to the Special Investigation Team of the Kochi police.