Kochi: A man who indulges in stealing of brand new cars parked for delivery at the showroom compounds finally fell in police net here.
P. Nazeer (54), a resident of Bangalore and originally hailing from Kozhikode, was dramatically arrested on Thursday.
It all happened when a police patrol team led by Ernakulam Town Circle Inspector K.J. Peter was engaged in vehicle checking near Cheranellor signal. Suddenly a Karnataka-registered sedan jumped the signal and sped past. The cops gave a chase and upon intercepting the car, the driver took to heels.
“We managed to catch him. Though he claimed to be a businessman and demanded to be released after being charged for traffic offence, we felt something fishy. We searched for details of the vehicle registration number in the Karnataka MVD website and realized that the registration number was fake,” police said.
However, more surprise awaited the police team. Soon they found out with the help of Karnataka Police that he was an accused in a series of inter-state vehicle thefts and the car he was driving was also stolen.
“Further probe revealed he had stolen a brand new sedan from a car showroom at Geethanjali Junction near Vytilla in February 2015. The car parked in the showroom compound overnight for final checks was found missing at the time of delivery in the morning,” they said.
CCTV footage from nearby buildings and toll plaza details had revealed that the car was taken to Bangalore. Since then the city police have been investigating to trace the thief in cooperation with the special squad of Bangalore city police commissioner for cracking vehicle thefts.
Allegedly, all the cars he had stolen were from the car showrooms taking advantage of the fact that keys would be kept in cars parked in the showroom premises for final checks before delivery. He used to simply get into a car and drive out of the showroom without drawing attention of the security or company staff. He was accused of stealing cars in this fashion from Mumbai, Bangalore, and Chennai.
