Lahore police on Saturday claimed to have arrested seven members of a notorious dacoits gang which had looted a number of jewellers' shops in Nawakot and recovered gold ornaments worth Rs 4.1 million as well as lethal weapons from them.
The accused have confessed to 16 incidents of dacoity and looting jewellers' shops in various areas of the provincial metropolis. Capital City Police Officer, Additional IG Malik Muhammad Iqbal disclosed this while addressing a press conference at Police Lines Qilla Gujjar Singh here.
Giving details, the CCPO said that some criminals at gunpoint looted gold ornaments from Sarafa Market Nawakot on August 22 last and escaped from the scene. On which, he directed senior officers of both investigation and operations wing to trace the incident.
Keeping in view the instructions, DIG Investigation Tassaduq Hussain, SSP Operations Aftab Ahmed Cheema and SSP Investigation Syed Ahmed Mubeen constituted special teams comprising SP City Division Rana Ahmed Hassan and SP CIA Chaudhry Masood Aziz to smash the gang.
A police team got information that Manzoor alias Jhoora was running an organised gang which was committing dacoities at jewellers shops. A special team headed by SHO Lower Mall Nauman Habib gathered more information about accused Manzoor and raided his hideout in Bahawalpur but the culprits succeeded to escape after a police encounter in which SHO received serious injuries during the exchange of firearms.
The CCPO said that another team was formed headed by DSP CIA City, DSP Shafiqabad to arrest the proclaimed offenders which raided a house in Sabzazar area on a tip-off and arrested seven members of Manzoor gang while two accused including Shahbaz and Sarwar ran away under the cover of darkness.
According to police, arrested criminals were class fellows and they were living in a rented house in Saidpur area in Sabazazar. They also confessed that they were also involved in dacoity incidents at jewellers' shops in Shalimar, Kotlakhpat, Hanjerwal, Factory Area, Gulshan Iqbal and Nawakot area.
The police recovered 235 tolas of gold ornaments, 200 tolas of artificial jewellery, seven tolas of silver ornaments, seven cell phones, four motorcycles besides illegal weapons including one kalashnikove, 12 pistols, one tracer pistol, two pump actions and a dagger.