KARACHI: Police on Sunday claimed to have busted a gang of robbers allegedly involved in house robberies in several localities of the metropolis.

East Zone SSP Azfar Mahesar in a press conference identified the three arrested suspects as members of an ‘Afghan gang’.

He said that on January 12, members of this gang entered a home of Shaikh Naeem within the remit of the Ferozabad police station.

After receiving information about the incident, police rushed to the spot, but the suspects escaped, leaving behind their car.

A police team comprising Ferozabad ASP Tariq Nawaz and SHO Aurangzeb Khattak with the help of modern technology, data of the seized vehicle and closed-circuit television footages traced and arrested the three suspects belonging to the ‘Afghan gang of robbers’.

They were identified as Samiullah, Abdul Mannan and Juma Khan.

The police claimed to have seized gold ornaments worth around Rs500,000, precious wristwatches and other looted valuables from them.

During the initial probe, the held suspects ‘confessed’ to having committed house robberies in the Gulshan-i-Iqbal, Ferozabad, Bahadurabad, Aziz Bhatti and New Town areas.

The suspects used mobile SIMs belonging to Afghanistan.

They used to hire car from rent-a-car facility to commit house robberies. They used to enter homes by climbing boundary walls, taking occupants hostage at gunpoint and looted cash, gold and other valuables, said Mr Mahesar.

The police officials expressed the hope that they would soon arrest the remaining three members of the gang.

Private security guards’ data

Meanwhile, the SSP East in his press conference revealed that the police had compiled data of 3,200 private security guards performing duties at various private places in district East.

This exercise has been done as security guards have been found to be involved in bank robberies and other crimes.

Furthermore, Mr Mahesar said that the police had also collected data of 9,600 CCTVs installed at private places, hospitals and schools in the district east as the police would try to obtain footages from these cameras to ascertain identity of criminals and take them to task.

Moreover, the police have also established four criminal record office rooms in which record of all criminals involved in street and other heinous crimes have been compiled.

The East SSP said that 32 ‘peace committees’ had also been formed to control crimes with the help of the community.

There were at least 53 ‘guest houses’ in the district east, which had been linked with a police IT system so that complete data of guests could be obtained.

The officer said in order to eliminate street crimes, the police were focusing on use of modern technology in addition to enhancing capacity building of the police.

Convicted absconder from Balochistan held

The counter-terrorism department (CTD) of police on Sunday claimed to have arrested an absconder, who had been awarded death sentence by a Balochistan court for killing three witnesses to a murder.

Acting on a tip-off, the CTD arrested Ali Akbar, alias Zafarullah, in the city, said CTD SSP Murtaza Bhutto.

The police claimed to have seized Kalashnikov and hand grenade from him.

The convict had ‘confessed’ killing six persons in Balochistan, the police said.

In the year 2004, he murdered a man, Usman Umrani, in Qalat city over some personal enmity.

Later on, he gunned down three witnesses to the said murder.

He was arrested and the local court in Balochistan sentenced him to death for killing the three witnesses, revealed the officer.

Apart from these murders, convict Ali Akbar also killed two citizens, Mohammed Umer and Sardar Hub Khan Umrani in 2005.

After fulfilling legal formalities, the arrested convict would be handed over to the Balochistan government.

Published in Dawn, January 28th, 2019