A local man with a criminal record was arrested on Monday in the northern district for stealing valuables worth about 38,000 patacas from a car parked on Estrada Marginal do Hipódromo, Judiciary Police (PJ) spokesman Leng Kam Lon said during a regular press conference yesterday.
Leng said that the 58-year-old jobless suspect is surnamed Wong, adding that the suspect had stolen valuables from cars on several occasions between 2017 and 2018, and had been jailed for more than five years in 2018.
According to Leng, the Judiciary Police received a report from a local man on Sunday that he had parked his car on Estrada Marginal do Hipódromo at 11 a.m. that day and left without locking it. Minutes later when he returned to the car, he found that the manbag he had put in the car was gone, reporting a loss of about 38,000 patacas.
Leng said that a police investigation found that Wong, who was wandering around Estrada Marginal do Hipódromo that day, had noticed that the victim did not lock his car before leaving, so he stole the manbag from the car.
Under questioning, Wong admitted to committing the crime and insisted that he had thrown away the bag, according to Leng, who added that Wong was transferred to the Public Prosecutions Office (MP) on Tuesday, facing an aggravated theft charge.
Meanwhile, Public Security Police (PSP) spokesman Lam Keong said at yesterday’s press conference that Wong had also stolen two handbags containing 9,000 patacas in cash from a car that was parked on Estrada Marginal do Hipódromo that was unlocked on the same day he committed the other theft.
Lam said that through the city’s CCTV system and a shop’s CCTV system, PSP officers identified Wong as the suspect, and recovered the two handbags from the stairwell of a residential building on Rua Quatro do Bairro da Areia Preta.
This undated handout photo provided by the Public Security Police (PSP) during yesterday’s press conference at the Judiciary Police (PJ) headquarters in Zape shows evidence seized from the theft suspect – cash, two handbags, a mobile phone and three purses.
