Kota Kinabalu: There has been an increase in motorcycle thefts in Sabah in the first five months this year with 344 cases so far compared to 302 cases during the same period, last year. CID chief SAC Omar Mammah said the thefts often occurred in the State Capital and mostly due to negligence on the part of the owners.
Omar strongly advised motorcycle owners to take extra measures to secure their motorcycles like using chains. On another trend, he said a total of 105 cases involving laptops being stolen from vehicles, were recorded last year and more than half happened in Kota Kinabalu.
Until April this year, he said the police have recorded 16 such cases and they believe the thieves used some kind of sensor device to detect laptops left inside vehicles.
As for action on m-cycle thefts, he said Sabah police crippled a gang known as "Awang Up" that was active since November following the arrest of 10 men, including its 24-year-old mastermind here, in Sipitang and Lawas, Sarawak, this month.
The arrests of the local suspects aged 17 and 29 led to the recovery of 11 Hondas worth about RM30,000 during the whole operation to bust the gang.
"The head of the gang who hails from Sipitang was apprehended on May 14 that led us to go to Lawas, Sarawak and arrest the remaining nine suspects between May 15 and 18.
"Four of the nine suspects were thieves or the sellers of the stolen motorcycles while the rest were believed to be the buyers or middle persons," he told a press conference, Wednesday.
He said fake plate numbers were used to sell the stolen motorcycles here, in Sipitang and Lawas.
Omar said the four suspects would be investigated under Section 379A of the Penal Code for stealing motorcycles while the six suspects were remanded under Section 411 and 414 of the Penal Code for keeping stolen property and abetting in the concealment of the stolen property, respectively.
He also did not rule out a possibility that the gang had stolen more than the 11 recovered Honda EX5 motorcycles that seemed to be their target machine.
