Bengaluru ATM cash heist: Cops track down suspects in 54 hours

Bengaluru: As many as 200 policemen belonging to 11 special teams were on the hunt for the suspects in the Rs 7.11-crore ATM cash van heist. They were tracked down within 54 hours of the loot, a senior police officer said. 

The police analysed route movements and examined technical evidence apart from scouring through close to 200-odd CCTV footages, which provided crucial evidence establishing the role of the accused. Police pieced together scattered clues by retracing the van’s exact movements, scrutinising partial CCTV footage and investigating the possibility of an insider’s hand. This led them to the main conspirators, whose arrests were made in quick succession, which yielded the recovery of a major portion of the stolen cash.

Police teams from Siddapura, Jayanagar and the Central Crime Branch were involved in the operation. Over 30 persons were questioned. 

CMS company, which deals with transportation of crores of rupees everyday, does not follow safety measures despite a set of guidelines issued by RBI, the probe revealed.

The guidelines on deployment of staff, training for security personnel, background verification, GPS tracking and recruitment of staff have been grossly violated which resulted in such incidents, police officials said. 

"We have prepared a report in this regard and submitted to the authority concerned seeking action for violating the guidelines," Bengaluru city police commissioner Seemant Kumar Singh said.

‘Bar mates plan robbery plot’ 

Naik and Xavier became friends in a bar and hatched the robbery plot. Naik trained him on how to escape from police radar after the robbery and gave the idea of changing fake number plates frequently while shifting money into multiple cars. Then the duo contacted Gopi to join them. Xavier had left his job at CMS company a few years ago after he met an accident.