Romanian held in Mumbai for Kerala ATM heist

ACCORDING TO POLICE, THE THREE ACCUSED CAME TO INDIA ON JUNE 25 AND REACHED KERALA ON JULY 8

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: A Romanian national, who was allegedly involved in the hi-tech ATM robbery in the state capital two days ago, was arrested in Mumbai on Tuesday night.

Accused Gabriel Marian identified two others involved in the crime as Bogdean Florian and Christian Victor, both of whom have reportedly left the country. The fourth person involved in the crime is yet to be identified.

“The Mumbai Police arrested him following our tip-off. Kerala police will bring him to the state on Thursday,” said state DGP Loknath Behra. The state police had released the CCTV footage of three accused after the incident came to light and decided to seek the Interpol’s help.

In the footage, the accused were found installing an electronic device inside an ATM kiosk to read the card. The police later recovered a skimmer device hidden in the smoke detector in the ceiling of the ATM unit. The chip in the card reader was missing and the money was withdrawn from various branches in Mumbai. Police suspect that after removing the chip that contained security details, the accused might have made fake cards to withdraw money.

According to police, the three came to India on June 25 and reached Kerala on July 8. They came on tourist visas and took rooms in a hotel for two days. So far, 22 people have complained about around `40 lakh being withdrawn from their accounts. COPS CLUELESS 24 HOURS AFTER TN TRAIN ROBBERY CHENNAI: Three police teams in Tamil Nadu are racing against time to crack the train robbery case but more than 24 hours later, the cops are still clueless.

Robbers had cut a gaping hole through the roof of Salem Express coach that was transporting soiled currency notes of the Reserve Bank of India to Chennai from Salem and escaped with `5.75 crore after breaking open two of the 226 wooden trunks on board on Tuesday.

Investigators are trying to figure out how and where the robbers boarded the train or where they could have cut through the roof.

Police have widened their search from the originating point — Erode from where the rakes of the train came — and were also looking at the CCTV footage of all the 10 stations between Salem and Egmore in Chennai where the train terminated.