Time stands still for Rolex thieves

A 65-year old man burst into tears when he was reunited with his valuable watch collection, which was stolen from him two years ago.

According to a Gulf News report, the mystery of the two-year-old theft was solved when Dubai Police arrested a man who stole the 24 valuable watches, worth Dh1 million.

Brigadier Khalil Ebrahim Al Mansouri, Director of the Criminal Investigation Department, said the criminals were arrested last week.

Lieutenant Colonel Ahmad Humaid Al Merri, Director of Criminal Investigation, said the theft took place in 2009, when the Asian shifted his residence to Dubai from another emirate.

During the move, a watch case that contained 24 Rolex watches went missing. Some of the watches were gold plated, white others were jewel encrusted.

Although the police circulated the description and serial numbers of these watches to all watch and jewellery outlets in the UAE, the investigation was fruitless until last week, when police received information that a person was trying to sell four watches carrying some of the circulated serial numbers to a well-known luxury watch outlet.

Police monitored the suspect when he took the four watches to the jewellery shop to be evaluated and arrested him as soon as he left. The other 20 watches were found in his car.

The man, a GCC citizen, said the watches belong to a Pakistani person who left them with him to sell against a commission.

Police arrested the second person, who turned out to be one of the workers who did some work at the victim's house.

He confessed that he took the watch case from the victim's house after he noticed that the victim was paying special attention to this case.

The victim, a UAE resident for 30 years, identified the Pakistani suspect in a suspect lineup and told police that this person was working in his house.

Lt Col Al Merri said the suspects were transferred to Public Prosecution for legal action.