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Diamond thief arrested

mochiko42

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http://www.thelocal.ch/20140913/chinese

Chinese national Jianguo Meng, 46, is linked to over a dozen heists since 2012, including the theft of a diamond ring worth $1.5 million from Bahrain last year, and was subject to an Interpol Red Notice, the international police organization said on Friday.

...

"In each case, two suspects entered the store and asked to be shown a selection of high-end diamond rings," the statement said.

"When a number of rings were out on the counter or table, the suspects would distract the salesperson by asking for directions or a business card, and then steal one of the rings when the vendor turned away."



Just wondering... would it really be that easy to distract the salespeople and steal the diamonds? I mean, if you're a salesperson showing a $1.5m ring to a customer, wouldn't you be super-nervous and make sure you keep your eye on the ring at all times? Or at least have increased security at the store? Seems a bit too lax if the salespeople didn't notice that a super-expensive ring vanished off the display counter... :confused:
 

arkieb1

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And don't they have video cameras capturing them and alerting other people in the shop out the back?
 

JewelFreak

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Strict policy at Tiffany is for only one piece of jewelry out of the case at a time, whether it's a $200 ring or a million-dollar necklace. We always put one piece back before showing the customer another.

I'm surprised the jeweler didn't have a special room for showing expensive stuff. All that I know of do that -- again, one piece out at a time (or often 2 salespeople, one to bring a new piece & take the previous one back to the safe, the other to do the trying on & selling) -- but in a private room. It's more personal & less public that way, and also makes it much harder to steal anything. Heads should roll because of their sloppiness at the stores these guys hit.

--- Laurie
 

Sunstorm

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Well, we always show customers several pieces if they like as otherwise how could they compare? Of course there are always at least two of us. It can actually be quite easy to distract people if two or three people come in, they talk a lot, want to see a lot of pieces, etc. It is important to control the situation and put away as many pieces as possible while pulling out others. Distraction can still occur with very experienced thieves and I have had people in the industry tell me that they still suffered theft even after decades of experience and several salespeople at the store. The Tiffany policy is safe and a good way to protect against theft but OTOH I have even had stores in the US allow me to take jewelry outside the store to check it in daylight. We use double doors so customers cannot just walk out with the pieces and when we pull out several we use pull out built in trays under the counters to put the extra pieces on to try and control the situation. Then again these are not as high value items as in the story, I am a bit surprised too that there were no extra measures taken when showing such high value items. I have no idea how they did it but from the stories I hear there are real pros out there.
 

Calliecake

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JewelFreak|1410783943|3751159 said:
Strict policy at Tiffany is for only one piece of jewelry out of the case at a time, whether it's a $200 ring or a million-dollar necklace. We always put one piece back before showing the customer another.

I'm surprised the jeweler didn't have a special room for showing expensive stuff. All that I know of do that -- again, one piece out at a time (or often 2 salespeople, one to bring a new piece & take the previous one back to the safe, the other to do the trying on & selling) -- but in a private room. It's more personal & less public that way, and also makes it much harder to steal anything. Heads should roll because of their sloppiness at the stores these guys hit.

--- Laurie


I would think most jewelry stores would have a similar policy especially when showing higher end items.
 
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