The South Zone team of the Hyderabad Commissioner's Task Force on Monday arrested two interstate habitual house burglars on Monday. The accused were said to be involved in at least 12 cases in Hyderabad, Vijayawada, Bidar and Kalaburagi and 700 grams of gold worth Rs 21 lakh was recovered.
The accused were identified as Mohammed Sameer Khan alias Sameer Pathan, a resident of Barkas, and his associate Mohammed Shoaib, who lived near the Race Course in Malakpet.
"The accused Mohammed Sameer Khan was born and raised in Bangalore and shifted to Hyderabad city at the age of 18. He is uneducated and speaks Kannada and Urdu. During his childhood, he used to assist his father in business. Later, he along with his mother migrated to Hyderabad for eking out a livelihood in the year 2000. He ran a CDs business and cloth business," the police said in a press note.
Officials said that he first went to jail in 2008 after he was caught in a cell phone theft case. However, he began burgling houses since then and was last arrested in November last year, by the Kodigehalli police in Bengaluru.
"His associate Mohammed Shoaib is born and brought up in Old Malakpet. He was arrested by the LB Nagar Police in the year 2013 and was lodged in Cherlapally Jail, where he came in contact with Sameer Khan," the police said.
Explaining their modus operandi, the police said that the duo would commit offences in broad daylight as one of the accused had poor vision.
"Due to this problem, he always needs an associate to commit offences. After being released on bail from Bengaluru, he and Shoaib planned to commit offences. Both the accused used to travel on motorcycle to commit offences. They took precaution to cover their identity by wearing either a cap or helmet. Generally, they committed offences on Tuesday," the police said.
"Sameer switched off his mobile phone before committing the crimes and does not give any technical clue. He minimised his contacts as far as possible and restricted his contacts to his wife, associate and receiver. He used different mobiles and different SIM cards to contact them. He frequently changed his residences, vehicles, mobile phones and SIM cards. He used fake IDs while purchasing mobile phones and SIM cards," officials added.
The police said that while Shoaib waited outside the locked house with a motorcycle, Sameer would break in and leave the house within 10 minutes.
In total, the police said that the accused had committed two offences in Hyderabad, five in Kalaburagi and four in Bidar Dist. They were also wanted in one offence in Krishna District of Andhra Pradesh.