The Mumbai police crime branch has arrested three men for allegedly riding on BEST busses and stealing people’s wallets and phones. The police waited at the Sion bus stop for two days disguised as civilians to lay a trap and arrest the accused.
The Mumbai Crime branch got a tip-off regarding the location of a man who has been stealing people's mobile phones and wallets while travelling in the BEST buses. They located his residence in Kalyan where he was living under a false identity. The police arrested him on November 9, and during his interrogation, he revealed the names of two more people committing similar crimes in the city.
After receiving the information from the accused, the police personnel stationed themselves for two days till Sunday, at Rani Laxmibai chowk, Sion disguised as civilians and set up a trap for the two accused.
The police knew the facial features of the accused persons and were on a lookout for them.
On Sunday around 3 pm they noticed two persons with similar facial features and their behaviour looked suspicious. The police then stopped them and began asking them questions which made them nervous and they started fumbling. This confirmed that they were hiding something so the police took them in for questioning after which they confessed to stealing mobile phones and wallets of passengers travelling in crowded buses. They admitted to having committed this crime in several crowded buses all over the city including Dadar, Worli, Santacruz, Juhu, and Andheri among others. The police recovered five expensive mobile phones from the accused as of now.
A case under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) section 379 (theft) has been registered against the three accused. "The accused have been arrested and police custody has been obtained till Monday," said a police official.
