KAMPALA –Police detectives have launched an investigation into a robbery of $0.8m (about Ugx3b) belonging to businessman, Lee Max, after suspects were captured on CCTV cameras.
Thugs, who are believed to have stolen the money, broke into the room of the businessman at Kololo Courts a week, before Christmas.
According to detectives from the three Police stations – Kololo, Jinja road, and CPS Kampala, the thugs trailed the businessman from one of the Banks in the Central business district; waited for him to go jogging, before breaking into his hotel room.
Police sources revealed that the thugs fled the country, two days after the said robbery when various security agencies were alerted to embark on the duty of tracking them down.
“This man entered the hotel room at 6:30 pm on a Wednesday. The thugs seemed to have studied his patterns. We have been told that he often kept huge amounts of money in his hotel room, which had a safe,” said a police source.
Patrick Onyango, the Kampala metropolitan Police spokesperson, confirmed the robbery of $800, 000 incident but hardly give details.
“It is true we are investigating the case of burglary and theft of money, belonging to a businessman. It is also true that some of the suspects have fled to Tanzania but our CID team has notified the Police on the other side to help in arresting these suspects,” said Onyango.
Though Onyango could not give details regarding the crime, sources have intimated that Max was staying in room No. 313 – the same where he kept the stolen cash. The case is being investigated under CRB: 860/2022.
Sources narrated that Max left his hotel room at 7:00pm for an evening workout on the Court’s premises, retuning at around 8:30pm. After refreshing, he is reported to have embarked on some tasks on his laptop, outside the room.
At around 1:20am, Max retreated to his hotel room to sleep but noticed the lock was damaged, and immediately informed the hotel management who responded – and fixed it.
“On entering his room he quickly noticed that his safe had been opened and money was missing. He quickly alerted the CCTV team at the hotel and they retrieved the footage from the time he booked into the room.
“The cameras showed two men who had booked room 310 breaking into his room and coming out with loaded bags,” said a detective.
The CCTV footage exposed the suspects – with one wearing a yellow shirt while the other was putting on a white shirt. The CCTVs clearly show the two men breaking into room 313 and leaving with two loaded laptop bags.
Sources revealed that three of the Hotel staff were detained in connection with the robbery on suspicion of tipping off the two Tanzanians, who broke into the room and took-off with the money.
Police sources revealed that in an attempt to quickly corner the suspects, Max had called security bosses – including Commissioner of Police, Beat Chelimo and Captain Namara but the thugs seem to have been faster than the investigators.
ACP Clare Nabakka, the deputy Police spokesperson, said many times thugs take advantage of normalised movement patterns to steal, or rob persons.
She said people needed to disregard the act of moving with huge sums of cash and embrace electronic transfers.
