ROURKELA: In a major breakthrough, Rourkela police arrested nine members of an interstate criminal gang involved in stealing gold ornaments from people under the pretext of cleaning them.
A team from the Sector-7 police station, while investigating a theft complaint lodged on September 19, recovered 103 grams of stolen gold, three motorcycles, seven mobile phones, and other materials from the accused, who are aged between 30 and 42 years.
The modus operandi of the criminals was to win the trust of their victims, pack their ornaments in small packets with some colorful substances, and flee after replacing the packets.
Rourkela SP Nitesh Wadhwani stated that the accused introduced themselves to the victims as agents of the Patanjali group, offering to clean their gold ornaments free of charge.
While pretending to clean the ornaments, the accused would steal the original ones.
Wadhwani noted that the Rourkela police have recorded 27 such cases, and investigations revealed that the gang was involved in 21 similar cases in September and October this year across different police station areas of the city and the adjacent Bisra region.
He added that most of the gang members, who are from Bihar, had temporarily settled in the Gopabandhupali slum in the city.