Four men posing as cops intercepted a men vehicle carrying the ornaments, and on the pretext of taking them to the police station the gang took off with the loot at a traffic signal
It seems like a scene straight out of a film, as the city witnessed a well-planned con job yesterday. Four men posing as police officers cheated employees of a courier companyu00a0and fled with valuables worth Rs 3 crore.
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Con spot: The location on the Western Express Highway where the courier company vehicle was intercepted by the fake police
The incident occurred on Thursday night with the workers of Sai Couriers, a Kalbadevi-based firm that takes consignments from all over the city and sends it to different places in India. On the day of the crime, the company had 60 bags containing valuables — gold, silver, diamond ornaments and imitation jewellery. Four workers, including manager Amitkumar Saini had kept the bags in the Maruti Swift, like every day. From their office, they were on their way to the airport to catch the 11.30 am flight.
As the vehicle was on the Western Express Highway over the railway tracks in Bandra, it was intercepted by a taxi. Four men got out of it — two dressed in police uniforms and two in civilian attire. Of the two ‘policemen’, one was wearing the uniform of a sub-inspector and the other of constable’s. The officers in uniform asked the employees to come out of the car, claiming they were driving too fast.
The fake officers started questioning them. The manager Saini tried to call the owner of Sai Couriers, but the fake officer did not let them make the phone call. They pleaded to be allowed to contact the owner, but to no avail. Finally, the staffers were told they had to be taken to the police station. The fake police asked the workers to sit in the taxi they had come in, while the two uniformed officers got into the car carrying the valuables and went ahead towards Kherwadi.
At Kalanagar junction, the taxi stopped and the two ‘plainclothes policemen’ got out and escaped in another cab. The car with the valuables was already out of sight. Realising they had been duped, the employees called the police. The case was taken by the Kherwadi police station, and transferred to the Bandra police station, as it had happened in their jurisdiction.
ACP Shivaji Kolekar of Bandra division said, “We suspect that it’s an insider job. The accused had been following the car from Kalbadevi. They had hired a taxi at Haji Ali and were following the staff members of the courier firm. The amount we believe is around Rs 3 crore, but it may be even more as there were around 60 consignments. All the shipments were legal. We hope to crack the case soon.”u00a0
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