by Makis Synodinos

Security police handcuffed two Serbs, 53 and 50 years old, who had ransacked jewelry stores in the center of Athens using the rififi method.

The two perpetrators, who had previously been arrested as members of the “PINK PANTHERS” group since at least December 2023, had formed a gang and systematically committed thefts in jewelry stores in the center of Athens using the “rififi” method. The action of the two Serbian is captured in the video documentary presented by skai.gr.

The total benefit they obtained from their action exceeds the monetary amount of 315000 euros, while their participation in other criminal acts is also being examined.

Regarding the Pink Panthers criminal network in question, it has all the characteristics that distinguish well-structured and highly active transnational criminal organizations and is, according to the International and European Prosecuting Authorities (INTERPOL-EUROPOL), structured within the framework of Transnational Criminal Groups and Organizations of the Balkans countries. These groups are made up of people coming from the countries of the former Yugoslav Republic and present an international action, mainly targeting jewelry stores, in which they commit either thefts or robberies, in different ways and methods depending on the skills, techniques and abilities of their members. like nuclei in each country.

These groups usually operate in small autonomous business centers in each country, in which only compatriots (Serbia, Montenegro, etc.) who have permanent residence in the country where the jewelry store is located participate. They are professional thugs, with no other job and in all their attacks, they use postmortem and surveillance tactics of the store they have targeted even several days before the “hit”.

For their movements, they use forged or falsified documents, while they travel separately and in different ways to avoid the possibility of being arrested together. For their road trips, they use either vehicles with foreign license plates from different countries or vehicles from the respective country, which are registered in the names of other people, usually with a clean criminal record.

The members of the specific groups are usually people with a lot of experience in the specific activity internationally and people who have also engaged the international authorities.

In terms of their action, it is worth mentioning that they identified their target shops, carried out surveillance of them and subsequently, drew up their plan of action in order to enter them and remove jewelry and gold. Subsequently, they apparently had the proper channeling network for the stolen items, reaping a great financial benefit.

The approach to jewelry stores was made in the evening hours.