Hunt for ‘nice’ gang of burglars

THEY are sooo nice... but the women in summer dresses who carry large, luxury handbags make up a silver-tongued gang that is stalking Gauteng.

Some know the three women – who have a male driver – as the House for Sale gang, and for several months they have been conning their way into houses and making off with valuables.

The cars they use and their images have been caught on CCTV cameras all over Gauteng, and as yet police have not caught them.

On Tuesday they hit a house in Kensington, using a MO similar to ones they used before. One of the gang asked the domestic worker if they could use the bathroom. Once inside, the women stole electronic goods and quickly made their getaway.

Leon de Bruin, a member of the Bedfordview CPF, has been tracking the gang since September last year, when he became one of their victims.

What he has found is that they often target houses that are for sale, and convince a domestic worker to let them on to the property on the pretext of wanting to view it.

In De Bruin’s case, one of the women asked his domestic worker for his wife’s cellphone number, to get permission to see the house. The woman, said De Bruin, pretended to phone his wife. As his domestic worker gave one of the women a tour of the house, the other two placed valuables, including a laptop, in their large handbags. On the same day, they hit two other houses.

“They are absolutely the nicest people on the planet; they hoodwinked everybody,” he said. The vehicles they used had cloned number plates. “On one day we saw, on CCTV footage, their car with CA plates, and then on the same day the car had been fitted with NJ plates.”

On Friday, the Cullinan CPF said the gang tried unsuccessfully to gain access to a home in nearby Rayton by telling a domestic worker they were dropping off a wedding dress.