28 March,2017 08:10 AM IST | | Shiva Devnath
With stolen stash in his hand, burglar politely asks patrolling cops for directions to Dadar station; now an entire shamefaced police station is looking for the man
CCTV grabs show the thief walking straight towards the police van, before he asks cops for directions to Dadar
Meet the friendly neighbourhood cops of Mahim, who not only let a burglar escape right under their noses, but were also helpful enough to give him directions to Dadar, minutes after he looted a shop. It was only two days later, as they watched CCTV footage from the crime scene, that the police realised they had helped the thief get away.
The theft took place in the intervening night between March 16 and 17, at a general store near the Mahim Dargah, where cops are posted on bandobast duty around the clock. In fact, as the thief was leaving the crime scene, he even came across a patrol van. But despite the fact that he was walking there in the dead of night and was carrying a large bag of goods, the cops did not suspect a thing.
The burglar then looks back at the patrol van as the unsuspecting cops drive away
Excuse me, police?
As the police van drove past him, the crook even hailed the cops and asked for directions to Dadar, and they told him to take a left turn. The CCTV footage from the incident then shows the thief looking back at the van as it drives away. Emboldened by their inattention, the thief then stuck around in the vicinity for another half hour, until he finally took a cab to Dadar.
The shopkeeper, Raees Ansari, lodged an FIR at the Mahim police station on the morning of March 17. But it was only on March 19, when the cops got hold of the CCTV footage that they saw the accused walking past the patrol van and realised that he was the same guy they had helped.
Raees Ansari, the shop owner
'It's the same guy!'
"The thief broke into my shop around 3.30 am and came out around 4 am, leaving with Rs 48,000 in cash, along with goods worth over Rs 10,000. When I saw the CCTV footage, I was shocked to see him roaming around without any fear. Then the cops let slip that they had seen him that night and they had even helped him with directions," said Ansari.
Ansari added, "I have been running my shop here for more than 20 years, and most of the time, the police stops anyone seen loitering so late at night, so I am amazed that the thief was not stopped by the cops. He hung around for 30 minutes at the Mahim Dargah junction, where there is 24X7 police bandobast. He would have been arrested if the police had been alert."
