Spanish police have arrested a gang of ten people who stole a number of iPhones from an Apple Store in Madrid over a two-month period. The gang members chewed through the security tethers used to prevent the device from being stolen.
The group, which included eight minors, stole 24 high-end iPhones over the period, with the total haul valued at approximately €23,000 ($24,350). While the Apple Store in question is not identified, other than being located in Madrid, sources of El Mundo believe it to be the Puerta del Sol outlet in the center of the city.
Madrid police say the investigation began in late 2016 when the store’s staff noticed an increase in the number of iPhone disappearing from the shop floor. It seems the group would enter the store in a “joint, planned, and distributed manner,” The members of the gang would then spread out to make it more difficult to find the iPhone if the staff became alerted to the theft.
One member of the team, let’s call him “Jaws,” would be assigned the task of chewing through the security cable until it was weak enough to be broken. Once the iPhone was free of its bonds, the device would be passed from gang member to gang member until it worked its way to the store’s exit, where another member of the gang would be waiting to spirit it away.
The members of the gang were arrested after police caught one member attempting to sell one of the stolen iPhones. The eight juvenile members of the gang are currently being held, while the two adult members have been hit with a restraining order that prevents then from being within 100 meters of the store (that would be 328 feet for a U.S. store).
