Six men have admitted being involved in a series of telephone frauds in which they posed as police officers to trick their victims out of thousands of pounds.

They were charged with conspiracy to defraud by false representation in a series of ten crimes across East Anglia between March and July this year.

Two of the offences were in Essex – including one in Steeple Bumpstead on March 30 when a family were tricked out of £7,000.

Five of the men were arrested in July after search warrants were executed in north London during an operation by officers from the Eastern Regional Special Operations Unit (ERSOU), which in March set up a special task force to investigate the rapidly-spreading frauds by thieves posing as police or bank officials.

More than 80 officers from Essex, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire and the Metropolitan Police Service Police were involved in the searches of six addresses in the Camden area.

Numerous phones and computers were seized by the regional team, which was set up to investigate hundreds of frauds and attempted frauds being carried out across East Anglia.

Elderly or vulnerable people were targeted by thieves who posed as police officers or bank staff who told their victims that their bank accounts had been infiltrated by thieves.

The tricksters claimed that as part of their investigations they needed to do forensic tests of the victim’s bank cards and PIN numbers or large amounts of cash to be used for forensic tests.

Mohammed Miah, 22, of Coopers Lane, Kings Cross, Mohammed Hussain, 22, of Malden Crescent, Camden, Motahir Rahman, 23, of Kiln Place, Kentish Town, Mohammed Ahmed, 22, of Hemingway Close, Gospel Oak, and Dedar Ali 20, of Cressfield Close, Kentish Town, all admitted conspiracy to defraud between March and July 2014.

Salam Uddin, 18, also of Hemingway Close, Gospel Oak, admitted a separate charge of conspiracy to defraud at Cirencester, Gloucestershire on January 4 2014.

The six men appeared at St Albans Crown Court on Monday and will be sentenced at the same court on December 4.