Dubai: Dubai Police have arrested three men who worked together to steal fancy cars from car rental shops in the country and recovered all the stolen cars.
During investigations it was found that the gang leader, who is a GCC national, had previously been arrested years ago for similar crimes by Major General Khamis Mattar Al Mazeina, Dubai Police Chief — who was then a lieutenant.
Maj Gen Al Mazeina said that some car rental companies continue to disregard simple procedures that include checking the validity of the credit card and confirming the identity of the person renting the car.
He said that Dubai Police had repeatedly warned rental companies, especially local ones, not to take these procedures lightly.
Maj Gen Al Mazeina said that it is illogical to rent out a car worth more than Dh500,000 while only blocking Dh900 from a credit card, without checking the credit limit of the card and not double checking the identity of the renter, and just taking a copy of a passport, which later turned out to be fake.
Major General Khalil Ebrahim Al Mansouri, Assistant to the Dubai Police Chief for Criminal Investigation Affairs, said that the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) received eight reports from different car rental shops about an Asian man, pretending to be a tourist, who rented out fancy cars worth around Dh500,000 for a day, using what was later discovered to be a fake passport and a credit card that had a maximum credit of Dh3,000.
The man committed the same crime eight times in just four days in Dubai and another emirate.
Investigations revealed the Asian man committed his crimes with the help of another Asian man, who was a UAE resident. He would take the cars from him and also drive them around.
Maj Gen Al Mansouri said that further investigations led the CID to the second man, and they found out that the first suspect had fled the UAE to his country, along with the cars.
The CID contacted the authorities of that country, who helped track the suspect. A team from the CID also went to the country to follow up the case.
The man was arrested and confessed to the crime, Maj Gen Al Mansouri said, adding that the man said that he stole the cars on the orders of the GCC national, who gave him money to rent out the cars, and promised to pay Dh10,000 for each car he brought him.
Colonel Salem Khalifa Al Rumaithi, Deputy Director of the CID for Search and Investigation, said that they found out that the GCC national lived in the UAE, and they set a trap to catch him red-handed with one of the stolen cars.
The GCC national confessed to the crime and to being the mastermind behind the operation and told the police about the location of the cars in the Asian country.
Col Al Rumaithi said that they sent a team to the said country and recovered all the cars.
