4-MEMBER GANG CONVICTED OF STEALING GOLD JEWELLERY
Staff Reporter
Justice Mamon Hamour
Gulf Times, Qatar
Dec 18 2006
A UKRAINIAN man and three Armenians – two women and a man – were
convicted yesterday of stealing gold items from a jewellery shop in
Doha on September 19. They received one year’s "suspended imprisonment"
and subsequent deportation.
The court ordered that the recovered jewellery be returned to the
shopowner.
Judge Mamon Hamour said that the convicts’ jail term was suspended
as there was a risk of them "influencing" their jailmates "which will
only make things worse".
The court ruled that the accused failed to prove that all the jewellery
items recovered from the gang, weighing 2.5kilos, were purchased from
Bahrain and Kuwait.
The ruling against the four, however, will not be implemented soon,
as they are also facing charges of stealing gold from other shops.
The accused came to Doha in batches on tourist visas beginning
September 11. Qatar was their third stop in the Gulf after Bahrain
and Kuwait.
Police said that 40gm of gold missing from one of the Doha shops was
found in their possession.
The Iranian shopkeeper claimed that the accused stole items worth
QR3,850 during their third visit to his shop.
He told the court that three of them came twice to his shop three
days before the theft, asking for prices and striking a conversation
to win his trust as serious customers.
"On September 19, the four accused came to my shop around 6.30pm and
my father was with me in the shop.
"During their third visit, I gave the first suspect (36) a jewellery
item which he put around the neck of the woman – the second accused
(28).
"When the third accused, a 26-year-old man, noticed that my father
was watching them, he tried to distract him by seeking information
about another item."
The shopkeeper said the fourth woman, 55, tried to distract him
as well.
He said he "saw" the first suspect throwing gold chains into the
breast pocket of the second suspect, but he was not sure because he
was busy with the "customers".
"After the four left our shop, we feared that some items were
missing from the shop and when the police called us the next day,
our suspicions were confirmed," he told the judge. The second
accused claimed that her confessions before the police were taken
under duress. Three of her accomplices also gave identical statements
before the court.
The judge reminded her that she had not confessed in the first place.
The first accused said he was a famous singer in Ukraine and he was
financially sound. He told the judge that he was staying in a luxury
hotel in Doha at the time of the alleged crime.
Ironically, he told the judge that he could not afford a lawyer and
asked the court to appoint one for him.
The Iranian shopkeeper said the accused failed to steal the items
during their first and second visits to his shop as he did not part
with the items they were asking about.