Officials of the Saifabad police station nabbed three members of an inter-state attention diversion gang when they were committing offences in the city, which also led to the arrest of two more members from their hideout in Uttar Pradesh. The police recovered 65 high end mobile phones from them. However, three members of the gang are absconding.
According to the Deputy Commissioner of Police, Central Zone V. Kamalhasan Reddy, Mohd. Imran Qureshi, Shahrukh Benadri Pathan and Farhaj Pathan, all residents of Meerut, Uttar Pradesh were arrested while committing a crime in Hyderabad.
The other two from the gang who were arrested from their hideout were Mohd. Nayeem, also a resident of Meerut, and Mohd. Anas Qureshi, a native of Old Delhi.
Other three members of the gang named Shakeer, Sajid and Mukheem, also hail from Meerut.
All the arrested gang members worked for a man named Bura alias Gora, who lured them with the promise of making good money.
Hailing from poor families, they were all trained for committing the offences. Nayeem was made as the in-charge for a team and Imran was chosen to lead the second team.
The offenders would operate independently in two teams and would check into budget hotels at Afzalgunj and other crowded places. They would introduce themselves as members of a band troupe and bring equipment along to avoid suspicion.
The teams would choose crowded junctions for committing offences where traffic moves at a slow pace and keep watch on expensive cars driven by a single person.
The accused would also keep a lookout for people who would keep high end mobile phones besides the driver’s seat.
While one of them would approach the vehicle from the driver’s side, another would bang the left side front window pretending that he was injured due to rash driving by the victim.
Engaging the victim in an argument, and confusing him, they would steal the phone and quickly disperse from the spot.
During interrogation, the police found that five such gangs from Meerut are operating in Hyderabad, Bangalore and Mumbai. The stolen phones would later be sold in Nepal to avoid tracking and arrest.
The gang confessed to have committed 13 offences in Hyderabad, Cyberabad and 5 offences in Bangalore.
