Police in France and Belgium say they have smashed a criminal ring that used fake court summonses accusing people of viewing child sexual abuse images to extort at least €3.5m (£3m). The phishing scam involved false emails from police, judges or institutions such as Europol threatening victims with prosecution unless they paid a “fine”. Police said they arrested 18 people in France and one in Belgium in an operation on Monday, with all but three of the suspects ordered to appear in court on fraud charges. One of the victims – who had been stung twice by the crooks – took their own life, and six others may have also potentially killed themselves, police said on Friday. “We thought that the fraud was being run by one central structure,” said Col Thomas Andreu, the head of one of the special French police units. “However, it turned out to be several little teams which were not linked.” The sums extracted from the victims ranged from less than €5,000 to up to €200,000, he said. The scam began at the start of 2021, leading the cybercrime section of the Paris prosecutor’s office to open an investigation. By June 2022 about 400 complaints relating to the scam had been made to authorities. Commissioner Christophe Durand, of the French OCLCTIC anti-cybercrime unit, said the “victims had suffered real distress”. Some of the money extorted from the men – whose average age was about 60 – was spent in France, but most was sent to Ivory Coast and other African countries. The man targeted twice was first made to pay €5,978 before the criminals asked him for a further €7,480. “Feeling powerless and trapped, he took his own life,” the police said. The suspects are aged between 20 and 50.