Pink Panthers
Pink Panthers is the name of a global group of jewel robbers belonging to organized crime . The estimated 200 members are attributed to a total of 150 robberies as of 2013 , in which they are said to have looted jewelry worth more than 200 million US dollars.
background
Most of the members of the gang of thieves, which consisted of a maximum of 150 people (as of 2014), come from the Balkans . The gang were accused of over 120 thefts up to 2009, in which they stole jewels and watches worth over 500 million euros in Europe, Asia and the Gulf States.
The gang is less of a gang of thieves in the classic sense, but rather a social network of professionals, from which new small groups are recruited for every crime. The group is organized in a kind of cell system, the members of which come together again and again according to an unrecognizable system in order to carry out their attacks. There is no visible clear hierarchy, as is the case in the Mafia , for example , but rather a few leaders who hire henchmen for their robberies, who for example steal escape vehicles or organize accommodation. The commonality of the members is that almost all of them come from the former Yugoslavia , therefore speak Serbo-Croatian and were mostly in the army or as militias. This is what Interpol attributes to their dexterity and unscrupulousness in handling weapons.
According to a BBC film , the group has good contacts with the Serbian secret service BIA . In particular, the stolen goods should be traded with the knowledge of politicians. A generation change seems to have taken place in recent years. According to the journalist Havana Marking, the younger members are no longer as professional, but act all the more brutally. This became evident when a police officer was shot dead by gang members in Serbia in 2013 and a police officer was seriously injured after an attack in Spain.
Naming
The group was named by Scotland Yard officials after robbing a jeweler in London in 1993. They hid their booty, diamonds valued at half a million pounds, in a jar of face cream - a tactic that was featured in a 1963 "Pink Panther" film.
Raids and Liberation Actions
After lavishly planned and quickly carried out raids in London, Paris, Dubai, Geneva, Monaco and Tokyo, among others, the majority of the Pink Panthers are still at large. Interpol estimates that by 2009, 120 robberies, mainly of jewelers, had been committed by members of the gang worldwide.
tactics
A typically precisely executed attack was that of a jeweler in Lausanne, Switzerland . On the afternoon of May 5, 2009, two members of the gang entered the store. The two elegantly dressed men worked through the robbery with great precision and forced the employees and the owner into an adjoining room. The attack lasted one minute and 47 seconds and resulted in a loot worth more than two million Swiss francs (around 1.9 million euros).
Several members were also released from prisons. These outbursts generated a lot of media interest. For example, in July 2013 a vehicle broke through the entrance gate of a Swiss prison and two prisoners were helped to escape with ladders. The perpetrators shot with assault rifles, but nobody was injured.
According to a German police commissioner, the gang has developed a way of working that they can adapt to the respective object, which makes them unpredictable. "They are very creative when planning their robberies and they make very few mistakes," said Stern in 2009. Weeks before a robbery, the gang members spy on the respective jeweler or come into the store as customers. You can show you jewelry and watches and know exactly whether a robbery is worthwhile. This means you know what stock is in the store and where which stones or watches are. They scout out the alarm precautions of the jewelers and know, for example, whether they have to ring the bell to get into the shop, whether the particularly expensive stones are stored separately in safes, or whether the jeweler has posted security personnel in plain clothes in front of the shop. You can also determine the position of the surveillance cameras and know when, how many staff are in the store and when there are few customers. The Pink Panthers always factor in the alarm going off and know how long they'll have before the police arrive. They also research which patrols are on patrol when and when the police change their shifts.
The gang used several escape routes. Usually the perpetrators flee the first few meters on foot, preferring to run in the opposite direction through one-way streets because no cars can follow them, then get into a stolen car - an accomplice controls it - and after a few kilometers park it somewhere to switch to another To change getaway cars.
They also adapt their escape route to local conditions. During an attack on a jeweler in a Hamburg shopping center in June 2007, the perpetrators of the Uzice group subgroup (named after their Serbian hometown Užice ) fled through a forest area on scooters because the police helicopters could not pursue them.
Investigations and arrests
In May 2009, French police arrested two members of the gang. The police had tracked down the two suspects after they had previously arrested two other men who were wanted by the authorities in Liechtenstein and Switzerland . They were also part of the gang. Members of the gang freed their colleagues from a Swiss prison in July 2013.
In July 2013, the Montenegrin police said they had arrested an alleged member of the "Pink Panthers". The Serb Igor Jocic was apprehended while trying to cross the border between the two Balkan states of Montenegro and Serbia. Which crimes the alleged perpetrator is accused of within the gang structure was initially not specified.
On January 12, 2008, a member of the gang with an unknown accomplice attacked a jewelry store on Breiten Strasse in Cologne, stealing jewelry worth 560,890 euros. In 2015, he was sentenced to six and a half years in prison for serious robbery.
In March 2017, two alleged members of the group were arrested after a robbery on a jewelry store on the Costa Meloneras in the south of Gran Canaria , and in February 2018 four alleged members were arrested in the act in Lugano, Switzerland .
Web links
- 2013 film documentary ( trailer ) "Master Thieves in Diamond Fever - The Story of the Pink Panthers" (Original title: Smash & Grab - The Story of the Pink Panthers)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Sexy scout, cool safe cracker , Spiegel Online, July 2, 2013.
- ↑ Police arrest robbers of the "Pink Panther Gang". In: Der Spiegel from February 13, 2014
- ↑ Police catch a member of the Pink Panther gang. In: welt.de. July 6, 2011, accessed July 26, 2017 .
- ↑ Smash And Grab: The Pink Panther Story. Director Havana Marking , BBC 2013
- ^ A b Felix Hutt: Organized robbery: Operation Pink Panther. In: stern.de. July 18, 2009, archived from the original on December 8, 2015 ; accessed on September 13, 2017 .
- ^ Peter Allen: Three suspected Pink Panther gang members arrested in Monaco. In: telegraph.co.uk. June 20, 2009, accessed April 30, 2018 .
- ↑ Master thieves in diamond fever - The story of the "Pink Panthers", 90 min., Broadcast on July 2, 2013 at 10:45 pm in Das Erste, information page on the documentary of the same name
- ↑ Switzerland: "Pink Panther" robbers manage to escape from prison , Spiegel Online, July 26, 2013
- ↑ They shot with weapons like in a war zone
- ↑ Gangsters free accomplices with submachine guns
- ↑ Bernhard Krebs: jewel thief in court. Six and a half years imprisonment for "Pink Panther". In: Kölnische Rundschau from June 30, 2015.
- ↑ Dos miembros de la banda de ladrones 'Pink Panthers', detenidos por el robo de la joyería Saphyr en el sur de Gran Canaria. In: eldiario.es. El Diario de Prensa Digital SL, March 24, 2017, accessed March 27, 2017 (Spanish).
- ↑ Famous band of robbers: Swiss police catch four members of the "Pink Panther" in the act. In: focus.de. February 19, 2018, accessed February 21, 2018 .