India News | Automatic Weapons, Imported Pistol Seized from Two Thieves Held in Greater Noida
Get latest articles and stories on India at LatestLY. Two thieves of a gang involved in over three dozen thefts across housing societies in Delhi-NCR were arrested in Greater Noida on Tuesday with two prohibited high-quality automatic weapons seized from their possession, police said.
Noida (UP), Nov 23 (PTI) Two thieves of a gang involved in over three dozen thefts across housing societies in Delhi-NCR were arrested in Greater Noida on Tuesday with two prohibited high-quality automatic weapons seized from their possession, police said.
Two 9 mm bore carbines along with several prohibited variety of bullets and three pistols, including one made in Italy, have been seized from their possession, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Greater Noida) Amit Kumar said.
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He said the gang which broke into flats in posh societies has at least 41 FIRs registered against them in the national capital region including Delhi, Noida, Greater Noida and Ghaziabad.
The accused have been identified as Shahnawaz, a native of Bulandshahr, and Imran, who hails from Ghaziabad, the police said, adding both are history-sheeters.
"They entered into societies cleverly. They would prepare themselves well for the strike and go into a society well-dressed in a car or sometimes on a two-wheeler in a way that nobody could even think of them being thieves," the DCP told reporters.
They would give reference of some random society resident or even use fake names or pressure gate keepers into allowing them entry. The duo also used a mobile app MyGate to gain entry into the societies, the officer said.
"Basically, they applied methods of social engineering to illegally enter societies and then broke into flats,” he noted.
Once inside a society, they would first take the lift to go to the top floor of a building and then come down using stairs, noticing which flats had locks on them, he said.
If they found multiple flats on the same floor locked, they would immediately target one of them and break into it, he added.
"They are so well trained into doing all this that it would hardly take them any time to gain entry into a flat. Once inside the flat, they would immediately gather all valuable materials or cash, if any, that they could lay their hands on and leave soon," Kumar said.
"They made sure not to carry too many items to avoid getting noticed,” he said.
The police have recovered a large amount of jewellery lifted by them from several flats and also seized automatic weapons seized from the home of one of the accused.
"The exact amount of the carbine guns is yet to be verified but the cost looks to be around Rs 20 lakh,” the officer said, adding Shahnawaz and Imran are history-sheeters in other districts and have a long criminal history, including opening gunfire on police personnel.
An FIR has been lodged against the duo at Beta 2 police station in Greater Noida and further legal proceedings have been initiated against them, Kumar added.
(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)