Bhubaneswar: The Commissionerate Police today busted an inter-state women looters’ gang involved in stealing valuables from different shopping malls in Bhubaneswar Urban Police District (UPD).
The police arrested nine women hailing from West Bengal for allegedly stealing goods worth lakhs of rupees from various shopping malls in the state capital. The arrested women, during interrogation also confessed to having stealing the goods from the malls, the police said.
The arrested women were identified as Labuni Samandhar (34), Shukla Banik (30), Manjari Chakraborty (32), Amrita Roy (40), Baisakhi Mirda (23), Putul Dev Mohanty (35), Malti Das(34), Rupa Mirda (32) and Mausumi Dutta (31) of North 24 Pargana district of West Bengal. All the arrested accused persons were staying at Hotel Janpath Inn near a private college within Khandagiri police station limits.
After receiving information, the police raided the hotel and arrested nine women of the looters gang, Zone 5 ACP Sanjeev Satpathy informed in a press briefing on Friday.
Modus Operandi: During preliminary investigation, the police learned that the women looters’ gang of 13 members are involved in several theft cases in different states of the country.
The accused women enter various shopping malls posing as customers and buy a few items to avoid suspicion. During browsing the articles, they used to steal several costly items by hiding them within a bag inside their clothes. Since they buy few articles while leaving the mall, no one suspects much about them.
Gang Busted: Using such modus operandi, the arrested women were having a field day stealing from various shopping malls in and around the city for the past few days. In the past two days, the employees of the shopping mall came to know about the series of thefts. After checking the CCTV of the mall, the women were indentified. It was also known that after stealing, women hide the stolen items inside their sarees in an innovative way and walk away. The mall authorities then informed the Nayapalli police station. Taking the matter seriously, the cops zeroed in on the gang members from the hotel.
Festive Season: The women looters’ gang come together from their state to different states to steal and shop-lift. When they leave home, they also take their family members with them. As the Raja festival is approaching in Odisha, the women gang members came to know that the malls here stay crowded during this time and this could be a golden opportunity for them.
Keep this in mind, the women looters’ gang came to Bhubaneswar a few days ago and have been staying at different lodges and stealing from malls.
