AN armed bandit and his accomplice yesterday morning snatched approximately one million dollars from a woman minutes after she exited the Republic Bank on Camp Street and had gone to a popular pharmacy in Kitty, Georgetown.

This publication was informed that the criminals who were reportedly staking out the bank, pounced on the young woman after she travelled from the city bank and entered a pharmacy in the Kitty area.
Speaking with the Chronicle after the incident, the woman’s male companion Andy Mohamed, who operates a popular auto-electrical mechanic shop in the city, explained that his reputed wife entered the bank and spent

some time before exiting with close to a million dollars in cash which she had withdrawn.
He said that from the bank they travelled in his car to the pharmacy. Andy said his wife exited the vehicle and went into the pharmacy to purchase a few items.
According to Andy, when they pulled up at the pharmacy he noticed that a Honda CG 125 motorcycle pulled up behind him with two males of African descent and one of them entered the pharmacy behind his wife.
Andy said he immediately got the feeling that the men were up to no good and promptly exited the car and went into the pharmacy behind the man. However, when he entered the pharmacy the bandit had already relieved his reputed wife of her bag, at gunpoint, and was on his way out of the building.
The bandit, upon seeing him, pointed a gun to his face and he immediately put up his hands in submission and the gunman passed him shoulder to shoulder, jumped on the motorcycle and sped away.

Andy said he quickly jumped into his car and trailed the men on the motorcycle to a location on D’Urban Street, Lodge. There the men rode the motorcycle into a shop, ripped off the number plate, installed an auto dealer number plate and joined a waiting motorcar and made good their escape.
The bandits then hurried away from the D’Urban Street business place which is the ‘Rising Sun Grocery and Beer Garden’, which also operates the Step In Style Boutique.
After the men left, the police who had been already contacted by the victim’s husband remained at the D’Urban Street location until the police arrived.
The police cordoned off the shop and began searching for clues. The black Honda CG motorcycle was found in the shop bearing the auto dealer number plate ‘MR 4’. The victims’ handbag was also reportedly found discarded in a garbage bin outside the shop.
The police arrested and questioned the occupants of the shop who were there at the time as they enquired about the owner of the motorcycle and who rode it into the shop seconds before the police arrived.

FAKE LICENCE PLATES
Unaware that they were traced and were being watched, the criminals abandoned the motorcycle, after changing the number plate, and entered a vehicle that was parked outside the ‘Rising Sun Grocery and Beer Garden’ and made good their escape. The registration number of the vehicle that the bandits escaped in is PRR 6697.
Meanwhile later yesterday, ‘A’ Division Commander Clifton Hicken told this publication that the police were unable to trace the vehicle number to anyone since it was a fake licence number, just like the plate on the motorcycle that the bandits had used. The motorcycle was also confiscated by the police. A woman, who reportedly started to hurriedly close the doors of the shop after the bandits parked the motorcycle inside, was up to last evening detained at the Kitty Police Station assisting with the investigation. A senior Police rank told the Chronicle that every effort will be made to ensure that these brazen bandits are caught and brought to justice. A copy of the surveillance tape, which captured the entire robbery incident from several angles, was also handed over to the Police. The shocking video recording of the robbery will also be circulated to media houses today.

(Leroy Smith)