Police arrested three young men on suspicion of robbing taxis in the Jerusalem area. The trio, two men and a woman, in their twenties, were arrested in an operation by a criminal gang at the Shai District Police Headquarters.
In recent weeks, a quiet investigation has been underway into a gang suspected of robbing taxis and injuring their drivers. According to the report that reached the police, the trio, who had blue ID cards, used to get into a taxi in Jerusalem and ask the driver to take them to Qalandiya.
Upon arriving at the scene, the young men would beat the driver, throw him out of the taxi, and leave him injured on the side of the road. They would sell the taxi to one of the slaughterhouses scattered throughout the territories.
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Following intensive activity, the trio was arrested. During their interrogation, some of those involved linked themselves to the various robberies.
Sgt. Shai Coventur, head of the criminal division, said, "The phenomenon of taxi robberies is a serious phenomenon in which taxi drivers are attacked with severe violence, and there is always the fear of combining a criminal incident with a terrorist incident, and therefore we are not taking any risks and taking a tough stance on this phenomenon.".
Coventur added that since the beginning of the year, several gangs of robbers operating in all parts of the country have been arrested, robbing taxi drivers and taking them to the Judea and Samaria territories. He called on taxi drivers to exercise extreme caution and not take passengers to questionable places, "especially from the center of the country to the occupied territories.".
