KOCHI: A police officer was caught stealing gold ornaments from one of his childhood friends on Friday, causing more embarrassment to the Kerala Police, who have not yet recovered from the shame after one of the officers was found stealing 10kg of mangoes recently.
Amal Dev, 35, a civil police officer attached to the AR camp of Kochi City police, was arrested for stealing 10 sovereigns of gold ornaments from the house of Natesan, a resident of Njarakkal. The gold belonged to Natesan’s wife and was kept in the cupboard in the couple’s bedroom. The alleged robbery took place on October 13.
“Both are childhood friends. The accused was a frequent visitor to Natesan’s house. Ever since the family members came to know about the missing ornaments, they were suspicious of the officer as he had entered the bedroom just a few hours before the ornaments wents missing. This forced the family to lodge a complaint,” said an officer with Njarakkal police station.
“Based on the complaint, we questioned the people who visited the home. Though the family members named the officer, we were confident that he would never commit such a shameful act. Besides, they were family friends.
But when we started questioning the officer as part of the procedure, he started showing some unusual behaviour. This raised doubts among us and so we questioned him in detail. He confessed to the crime. We will recover the ornaments pledged in a private financial firm near Njarakkal,” the officer said. Sources in the police department also confirmed that the accused has been into online rummy games and is believed to have suffered a huge loss after playing the game.
The police registered a case under Section 379 of IPC and he was produced before the court on Friday. Earlier this month, an officer was caught on CCTV camera stealing 10kg of mangoes from a pushcart at Kanjirappally in Kottayam.