4 held after heist in Tokyo’s Ginza district
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Police officers conducting investigations at the crime scene following the robbery of a luxury watch store in Tokyo on Monday.
PHOTO: AFP
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TOKYO - Four people were detained in Tokyo on Monday after they smashed their way into a luxury watch shop and took off with items worth more than US$740,000 (S$980,000), local media said.
The robbery on Monday in the upscale Ginza district was an unusual heist in a country with famously low levels of crime.
Three people entered the shop with their faces covered and armed with crowbars, which they used to destroy glass cases and snatch more than 30 items, local media said.
Public broadcaster NHK said four people were taken into police custody and one suspected member of the gang was still at large. It is not clear if the items were recovered.
The robbery left the shop’s display windows shattered, with a box bearing the Rolex logo visible at the scene.
In Japan, known for its low crime rates, valuable lost items are often returned to owners.
Ginza’s fancy boutiques have been targeted before.
In 2014, thieves made off with a diamond ring worth more than US$300,000 in a Christmas Eve robbery.
And in 2007, members of a gang known as the Pink Panther stole more than US$3.5 million worth of items from a jewellery shop in the district. AFP
