Four underage snatch thieves due in court

CHAMK ARMON district police in t he capita l will send four underage suspects to the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Wednesday after they arrested the group on Sunday at Koh Pich Ex hibition Centre on accusations of bag snatching.

Chamkarmon district deputy police chief Chhuon Meach Simolin said on Tuesday that the suspects committed many cases of snatch thefts in two districts – Sen Sok and Chamkarmon.

“We plan to send them to the court on February 26 as we are still questioning them one by one,” he said.

Meach Simolin said at about 2pm on February 11, the suspects snatched a handbag from a foreign couple in Tuol Tompoung I commune in Chamkarmon district. They then escaped on motorbikes.

After the crime, police investigated the case, collecting information from witnesses and noting the registration plate numbers of the suspects to identif y them.

At about 10:30pm on Sunday, police arrested a total of eight suspects on Koh Pich. But after they questioned them, only four were found to be involved in the snatch theft and the rest were released.

However, police could not make their identifications public because they are minors and the court has not charged them yet.

“They confessed that they were students, but they dropped out of school. Their ages are between 15 and 17,” Meach Simolin said.

The suspects confessed that they snatched the bag from the foreigners in Tuol Tompoung I commune and from many other victims in the other two districts, Meach Simolin said.

Earlier this month, Ministry of Interior secretary state Sak Setha pushed the relevant authorities to act against all types of crimes across the country after a ministry report showed that they had increased last year compared to 2018.