A MECHANIC and a police rank are among several persons in custody over the alleged theft of a white Toyota Premio on Sunday.

It is alleged that police ranks in Regional Division 4(B) responded to a report of an alleged simple larceny committed on a 34-year-old taxi driver, Rameshwar Singh of #70 Village, Correntyne, Berbice, of a white Toyota Premio motor car with registration number HD 2132 (valued at $2,400,000).

According to a police report, it is alleged that on Sunday, at about 18:00 hours, a party of police ranks acting on information received, proceeded to the home of a 27-year-old mechanic of Patentia, West Bank Demerara (WBD) and conducted a search for the stolen car but nothing of evidential value was found.

However, after an interview was conducted with the said mechanic and based on information received, the police ranks proceeded to the residence of another mechanic who resides in La Grange, WBD where a search was carried out on his workshop and several car parts belonging to HD 2132 were found and positively identified by the taxi driver as his.

There were also documents from a shipping company which were found and positively identified by the victim, Rameshwar Singh.
As a result, the workshop owner from La Grange was arrested and subsequently escorted to Diamond Police Station.

The police noted that acting on ‘further information received’, police ranks proceeded to Kuru Kururu, EBD where HD 2387, a white old-model Premio, was found in a yard abandoned. This motorcar was allegedly used to hit Rameshwar Singh’s car from behind, which caused him to stop in the vicinity of Providence, East Bank Demerara. When Singh exited his vehicle to check on the damage, he was pounced on and robbed of his car and cash.

Meanwhile, at about 08:00 hours on Wednesday, a police rank on seven days sick leave was contacted by the investigators and questioned. The police rank then took the investigators to Canal #One, West Bank Demerara and pointed out a freshly sprayed-over ‘gun metal’ Toyota Premio to be the said car that was stolen from Rameshwar Singh.

Despite being in a different colour, the victim and the investigators were able to identify the car from the chassis number. Some of the parts were missing from the said car.