5 members of burglars’ gang held

Prayagraj: Five members of an inter-district burglars’ gang, including a jeweler, were arrested by a joint team of special operation group (SOG) and Georgetown police near Shankargarh area here on Saturday, police said.
Police have also seized Rs 4.26 lakh cash, three country made pistols of 0.315 bore along with four live cartridges, one scooty, one bike, two laptops, nine mobile phones, stolen gold and silver jewellery, idols of Radha-Krishna, jackets and 50 foreign coins from their possession.
Those arrested were Sumiran Kol of Bara, Ashish Kumar of Shankargarh, Sani Kumar of Lucknow, Javed Akhtar of Utrav and Kamlesh Soni of Shankargarh. Police said Sumiran Kol has a total of 16 criminal cases registered against him in different police stations of city, including Shankargarh, Ghurpur, Bara, Naini, Shivkuti, Kydganj and Georgetown. Police claimed that this gang had executed more than two dozen thefts and burglaries in different parts of the city in the past six months. The gang members are aged between 23 and 50 years. While Ashish Kumar was wanted in connection with seven criminal cases, other gang members Sani Kumar (nine), Javed Akhtar (18) and Kamlesh Soni (2) have cases registered against them respectively. Inspector (Georgetown) Dhirendra Kumar Singh said the gang used to conduct a recee of their potential targets. The gang used to target closed houses and execute crime in midnight. The SHO said the gang had connections with a local jeweler whom they used to sell stolen or looted jewellery. They were arrested while they were planning to execute a theft in trans-Yamuna area. Now search is on the kingpin of the gang. t nn