HAVING been the recent victim of a snatch theft in Kuala Lumpur, which is fast gaining notoriety among visitors and residents alike, I would like to share my experience and offer some advice to our police force.

I was entertaining a large group of foreign visitors, including professors from a distinguished British academic institution, and we were walking within the grounds of a five-star hotel in Jalan Sultan Ismail when two motorcyclists rumbled by the hotel’s front entrance and snatched my handbag.

I lost money, a Mont Blanc special-edition pen, Amanah Saham Bumiputera passbook, cheque book, credit cards, bank cards, loyalty cards, my Nokia mobile phone, Blackberry, several thumb-drives with key business data, identity card, driving licence, travel tickets and international passport, among other personal belongings.

Kuala Lumpur once again lost valuable visitor reputation and my friends, having witnessed this blatant breach of security in the grounds of a well-advertised hotel chain, will almost certainly never stay there again.

I asked the hotel manager, who eventually showed up to take my statement, what random motorcyclists were doing outside his hotel lobby in groups but did not receive an acceptable explanation.

The nightmare had only just begun. You have to experience making a police report over a snatch theft before you can ever begin to imagine what it is like to be Malaysian and dare to advertise our unique hospitality.

Four visits to four different police stations later (from the Pondok Pelancong in the Saloma Complex to a cramped sergeant’s office in what appeared to be a dismal apartment-type police complex downtown), I finally obtained my report but not before 2am.

With the assistance of friends, I had to immediately make some 30 calls to cancel cards (whose details were not with me at the time) and to visit call centres to cancel mobile phone numbers and do other things that one has to do in such circumstances to ensure every possible further breach of one’s privacy is prevented.

That night I didn’t sleep for fear that I might have left evidence of my residence in my handbag, and that someone would break into my home.

All of the next day was spent trying to get an IC replacement, affirm my residency and nationality status, apply for a new passport, reapply for bank automated teller machine cards and cheque book replacements, buy a mobile phone and Blackberry, install new numbers and email addresses, etc.

I learnt through my own investigations that this hotel and others on the same street witness so many snatch-theft incidents every week that it doesn’t bother them any more. Women tourists with designer sunglasses and branded handbags are the target and they become hysterical when their shopping money gets hijacked.

Some advice to those paid to keep our streets crime-free: simply station a couple of well-heeled tourist decoys wearing branded eyewear and carrying branded handbags to sit with plainclothes policemen in some of these favourite haunts, and have others stationed nearby to nab the offenders. I’m pretty sure it will be an easy haul.

Alternatively, why not just station some policemen on that street? We seem to have many peace-keepers to spare whenever there is a rally or demonstration.

The syndicates operating in the area are not hard to bust. With a little imagination, and some hard work, we can all do an honest day’s job of solving crime.

I have since learnt that if your passport expires, you can get a replacement in two hours; however, if you are a victim of ragut (the buzzword for snatch-thievery), you will be punished by having to wait at least a month to re-establish your identity in this country before you will be allowed to leave it.

MILLICENT DANKER, Kuala Lumpur

Source: NST – October 31, 2008