SEPPA, Mar 28:  After nearly a month, the East Kameng Police said it has solved the broad daylight SBI ATM armed robbery case that had taken place on February 15 last in the district headquarters. Seppa Police arrested prime accused Taguk Rang (32) and recovered  Rupees 20 Lakh cash out of the total Rupees 40 Lakh looted.
In an official press statement, Superintendent of Police, East Kameng Rahul Gupta informed that the accused arrested on March 24 last is employed as a contingency worker in the RWD department and was in desperate need of money as he was under heavy debt involving many people. He was an occasional gambler which worsened his financial condition.
During the interrogation, the accused revealed that he has been planning to rob an ATM for over a year. For this, he purchased a revolver on December 2022, through a gun license of his uncle (SBBL country-made gun) which the latter entrusted him to use. He did recce of the SBI bank over six months and followed the movement of the ATM money replenishing vehicle many times including monitoring the staffers.
By doing this, he could identify the staff and the money van and the course of their movement. Also, he used to check all the ATMs in the town to see if cash is available. By this process, he could tell that the cash replenishing team would first go to Type-1 SBI ATM and would carry maximum cash at that point.
The accused came prepared on the day of the crime with a fully loaded revolver and black helmet and bluish muffler to hide his identity. He applied black cellotape over the nameplates to hide the vehicle numbers from the CCTV. When the cash replenishing party was about to leave the bank, he left from the bank in advance to reach the Type-1 ATM and parked his two-wheeler few meters away. He was waiting for the cash team to reach close to the ATM with their suitcase. Just when they were about to enter the ATM with the suitcase, he opened fire and snatched the cash suitcase. The lone police personnel who accompanied the cash replenishing team could not do much as the accused opened fire close to him. With this cash suitcase on his two-wheeler, he fled from the spot.
Prior to this robbery, the accused had also done a recce of ATMs in Itanagar at Zero point and Bank Tinali but did not execute the crime because of the presence of many CCTV cameras around this area, informed the SP.
Meanwhile, police recovered Rs. 15,50,000 cash remaining from the robbed amount,Rs. 5,25,000 that he paid to five people to repay his loan, a revolver used in the commission of the offense, a two-wheeler, car bought by the accused from the robbery money, a mobile, helmet, jacket, mask, and shoes the accused was wearing during the commission of the offense and empty cartridge of two rounds fired during the commission of the offense.
Further, SP appreciated the technical  and investigation team  led by Dy SP Seppa, Matin Ratan for solving the case.

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Kenter Joya Riba

(Managing Editor)
      She is a graduate in Science with post graduation in Sociology from University of Pune. She has been in the media industry for nearly a decade. Before turning to print business, she has been associated with radio and television.
Email: kenterjoyaz@easternsentinel.in / editoreasternsentinel@gmail.com
Phone: 0360-2212313

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