The Hindu : Karnataka News : Rs. 70 lakh looted from security agency office in Mysore

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Karnataka

Rs. 70 lakh looted from security agency office in Mysore

Staff Correspondent

Police suspect involvement of present, past staff of the agency

The guards did not open fire at the robbers
Police claim that there are many loose ends

— PHOTO : M.A. SRIRAM

Unanswered questions : Personnel of G4S Security Services explaining the dacoity to the police at their office in Mysore on Sunday.

MYSORE: In a sensational dacoity that even shocked the city police, seven miscreants allegedly looted Rs. 70 lakh from the office of G4S Security Services (India) Private Limited, a reputed security agency, at Metagalli here in the early hours of Sunday after assaulting two armed security personnel. The miscreants opened the vault room using duplicate keys and made away with a steel trunk containing Rs. 70 lakh in cash.

Senior police officials, who visited the agency on Sunday, did not rule out the involvement of present and past employees of the agency in the heist.

The agency is responsible for loading cash into the ATM centres of ICICI Bank across the city.

According to the police, security controller Vinod Kumar and gunman Suresh were on night duty from 7 p.m. on Saturday. Vinod told the police that a man knocked the door around 00.30 a.m. and attacked him on his hands and legs with a sharp weapon when he opened the door. Immediately six others entered the office and attacked gunman Suresh. Both were gagged, tied and locked in a room.

Though Suresh was armed with a double-barrel gun, he neither threatened to open fire nor opened fire at the miscreants, giving suspicion to the police.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) V.S. D’Souza, who visited the office on Sunday with Police Commissioner Parashivamurthy, told The Hindu that there were several loose ends in the case since the miscreants took away the money with great ease and without breaking open the locks of multiple doors of the vault room.

“How could the miscreants acquire duplicate keys of high-precision locks of the vault room? Why did Vinod open the doors when the miscreants knocked, without verification? Why did they not open fire though both of them had guns with them? How could the miscreants straight away enter the vault room in a large building? These things have given suspicion on the role of the agency’s employees,” the DCP said.

It is learnt that one set of keys was with cash custodian Charles and another set with supervisor Nagaraj.

The police have taken into custody the person who was the cash custodian for questioning.

“We have questioned Vinod and Suresh. We will question the present and previous cash custodians and supervisors of the agency. The list of employees has been procured and we shall question everyone,” Mr. D’Souza said, expressing confidence of cracking the case in a couple of days.

Mr. D’Souza said finger prints had been collected and investigations were on.

The night security personnel told the police the miscreants were youngsters and were conversing in Hindi. The power supply and the siren connection were disconnected before the office was raided. Even the cameras inside the vault room had been damaged, they said.

The dacoity came to light only when the supervisor rushed to the office when his phone calls to the security personnel were not answered.

It may be mentioned here that Rs. 13.25 lakh was looted from State Bank of Mysore, N.R. Mohalla branch here recently.

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