The scam, the haircut - and 'bingo': Stolen bicycles returned to construction workers from Sri Lanka
A happy ending: Two foreign workers agreed to let 6 teenagers ride their electric bicycles, but the latter did not return them - and sold them to a shop in Nazareth. The workers described that one of the teenagers had a 'very unique haircut', which led youth investigators to a breakthrough: 'I know most of the youth in the area. I felt it was a bingo.'
Over the past weekend, six teenagers on summer vacation allegedly scammed construction workers from Sri Lanka and stole two pairs of electric bicycles from them. Less than two days later, youth investigators in the Amakim district managed to return them to the workers, thanks to the haircut of one of the teenagers.
'On August 8, we received a complaint at the 100 call center from a passerby, who told us about two foreign workers working hard for their living at a construction site in the north, whose electric bicycles were stolen by a group of teenagers,' said Staff Sergeant Major Ben Hen, head of the youth squad in the Amakim district.
Immediately after receiving the complaint, the foreign workers were questioned and provided a detailed description of the incident:
'From their detailed complaint, it appears that a group of teenagers arrived near their home and asked them for a ride on the bicycles. At first, the workers refused, but the teenagers continued to ask and plead, and in the end, the workers relented and gave them a ride. They asked them to return the bicycles to the same address,' added SSM Hen.
During the questioning, one of the workers remembered that one of the teenagers had a very unique haircut, and beyond that, they had no details about the suspected teenagers.
'Since I know most of the youth in the area, as soon as the workers identified the haircut, I felt it was a bingo. I sent two youth detectives to his home, and they brought him to the station on Sunday morning. He was questioned and confessed, and through him, we reached the rest of those involved in the theft. In total, six teenagers are involved, all of them students on summer vacation, and all of them were questioned on suspicion of theft,' he explained.
According to him, one of the teenagers said during the interrogation that another teenager had already sold both pairs to a bicycle shop in Nazareth. The investigators located that shop, arrived there, and seized the bicycles that were already up for sale. As it turned out, the teenagers received 300 shekels for each pair from the shop owner, who is not suspected at all of involvement in the offense, as he did not know they were stolen.
'It was a very moving situation to return the stolen bicycles to the foreign workers; it is the only means of transportation they use, and they purchased them through hard work in the heavy heat of Israel. We provide professional and high-quality service to the entire population, including the foreign workers who work and live here. To my joy, we managed to improve the country's image after the damage these teenagers caused,' concluded SSM Hen.
