New camera to help police catch auto thieves

The police may soon have a gadget that can quickly detect blacklisted vehicles - like stolen cars or those used in crime getaways.

The technical trial was completed last week on the Mobile Automated Vehicle Screening System (MAVSS), which comprises a car-mounted camera and a laptop computer.

The camera, which sits on the roof of police patrol cars, can scan up to six licence plates of parked or moving vehicles every second and feed the scans into a laptop in the police car. The scans are then compared against a database of stolen or wanted vehicles for matches.

The system, customised from a similar one in use by European crime enforcement agencies, does away with manual screening.

The police said it is not certain when the system will be introduced here. (story)

Man arrested in $50,000 robbery

1 of the two men behind the Chiltern Drive abduction and robbery was arrested on Friday afternoon in a police ambush near his home in Sengkang.

The 54-year-old man, a Singaporean, did not put up a struggle when confronted by police officers.

On Tuesday, two robbers made off with $50,000 after they confronted a woman in her 60s at knifepoint in her driveway and drove her BMW to a bank in Hougang Central where she withdrew the money and gave it to one of them.

They also held the woman’s three-year-old grand-daughter and a Filippino maid captive in the locked car at a carpark.

By Wednesday, the police established the identities of the two robbers - who are friends - and where they live. They are not known to their victim.

Assistant Commissioner Ng Boon Gay, director of the Criminal Investigation Department, on Friday told a press conference how the police tracked down their man. (story)

Police searching for missing teen

Police are looking for a 13-year-old girl who has been missing for over a week. Shaik Saiwa Shaik Hanif, a pupil of Jiemin Primary School in Yishun Street 71, went missing last Thursday.

She was last seen near the school and was dressed in her uniform - a blouse with white and blue stripes and blue skirt.

Police said she is of average build, about 1.45m tall, with a fair complexion and shoulder-length hair.

Her father, Mr Shaik Hanif Shaik Mohd, 41, said she had run away from home a few times since she turned 12 in January last year but this is the longest she has gone missing. Anyone with information can call police on 1800-255-0000. (story)

Police search for 2 suspects in shopping complex attack

The police are searching for two men who sprayed a male Chinese victim with an unknown substance at the Golden Landmark Shopping Complex at around 4 pm yesterday.

One man is described as wearing a white cap with a dark top and jeans, and has a scar on his right cheek. The other is plump with tattoos on both hands. He was wearing a light-coloured, short-sleeved top with dark pants.

“The male Chinese victim was sprayed with an unknown substance by two unknown persons who subsequently fled the scene,” a police spokesman said.

He was spotted near the entrance outside the building, groggy and behaving aggressively. He was foaming at his mouth with saliva and mucus was dripping from his nose onto his T-shirt.

The victim was sent to Singapore General Hospital, where he received outpatient treatment. (link)

Wanted man finally arrested after 10 years

Wanted by police for more than 10 years, Goh Chee Kiong was found out when the cops went to break up a quarrel between him and a Chinese national in Geylang on Jan 7.

Goh was jailed for two years and ordered to be given six strokes of the cane on Thursday for an attempted robbery in 1998.

He also admitted to stealing $45,400 from two companies and cheating a woman of $1,000, for which he was jailed another seven months.

A district court heard that Goh, an assistant manager with Studio Cinemas in 1997, stole $25,800 from the safe and went on the run. (story)

Serial killer hunting prostitutes in Hong Kong

Hong Kong police are investigating the killings of four sex workers in the past few days, suggesting a serial killer may be on the loose in the densely packed city.

Three victims, all in their 30s, were found in their ransacked apartments in two districts in the northern New Territories. A fourth was found on Hong Kong island on Monday.

The first two women had been robbed and strangled, one with a hose, while the third was certified dead with no apparent injuries early on Monday.

“We are adopting a very open-minded approach, we will rigorously pursue all lines of inquiries,” said Steve Li, a police superintendent, when asked if a serial killer may have been responsible.

“We can’t rule out the possibility that either one or more persons carried out these crimes.” (story)

Australian tourists taken hostage … briefly by Chinese man

Australian tourists briefly held hostage in China by a lone man armed with explosives on Thursday told of their ordeal as Canberra urged holidaymakers to heed travel warnings ahead of the Beijing Olympics.The man attacked a group of 10 Australian travel agents visiting the northwest city of Xi’an, famed as home of the Terracotta Warriors, on Wednesday before he was shot dead by a police sniper.

‘He was pacing up and down the bus, they couldn’t understand what he was saying. Then he turned around, opened up his jacket and he had a bomb strapped to him,’ said Sue Wynne, a friend of hostage Rhiannon Dunkley, after speaking to her.

Nine of the hostages were released by the man, but a 48-year-old woman was held captive for several hours before the gunman was killed.

Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said there was nothing to suggest the Australians were deliberately targeted and the motive for the attack remained unclear.

‘We’ve asked for a full briefing to try to understand the motivation,’ Mr Smith told journalists in Melbourne.

The travel agents were on an educational tour to Beijing, Xi’an and Shanghai, organised by a Sydney-based travel wholesale company, when the attack took place. (story)

Ring swallowing thief gets 1.5 years in jail

An odd job worker thought he had hit on the ideal way to swipe a diamond ring from a jeweller: he swallowed it, price tag and all. But Mohamad Azman Abdullah, 48, was caught right away, and handed to the police, who took him to hospital.

At Tan Tock Seng Hospital, doctors inserted a long flexible tube down his throat and into his tummy, using instruments at the end to fish out the $2,689 sparkler and its gold setting.

He had to stomach this uncomfortable procedure, called an endoscopy, which is usually done without anaesthesia.

In court on Wednesday, Azman pleaded guilty to the theft and was jailed 1 1/2 years. (story)

Edison “quits” HK entertainment industry

HK singer and actor Edison Chen said on Thursday that he would step away from the Hong Kong entertainment industry, in his first public appearance since a nude picture scandal broke in January.’I've decided to step away from the Hong Kong entertainment industry,’ Chen told reporters, while apologising to Hong Kong for the scandal which has drawn blanket media coverage over several weeks.

He said in a brief statement he would fulfil existing commitments before stepping down ‘indefinitely’.

Beijing police vow action on HK nude photos
Meanwhile in Beijing, Chinese police have vowed to detain anyone caught distributing nude photos of several Hong Kong pop stars that were recently posted on the Internet, state media reported on Thursday.

Hong Kong police said some 1,300 private shots of the celebrities had been stolen by the staff of a computer repair shop from a faulty laptop believed to belong to Canadian-born singer and actor Edison Chen.

The scandal has caused a media frenzy and feverish downloading and sharing of the photos. Hong Kong police have made several arrests and the investigation is ongoing. (story)

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Triads offering HK $500,000 reward for Edison Chen’s hand

Word has it that an underworld figure has offered a HK$500,000 ($91,000) reward to hack off one of his hands, reported Apple Daily Hong Kong.Chen has apparently been targeted by the triads after hundreds of obscene photos of him and several female celebrities like Bobo Chan and GillianChung were stolen from his laptop computer and posted on the Internet.

On Sunday, more photos of Chen and Chan were circulated online.

Apple Daily HK, quoting a police source, reported that someone is planning to harm Chen when he returns.

Chen is now lying low in Boston, on the advice of his management company, Media Asia. (story)

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