Home / Crime and Justice / Massive Sting Busts Gang Exporting Half of UK's Stolen Phones Globally
Massive Sting Busts Gang Exporting Half of UK's Stolen Phones Globally
6 Oct
Summary
- Scotland Yard's biggest counter-phone theft operation ever
- Afghan gang leaders arrested for exporting 40,000 stolen phones to China and Hong Kong
- Sophisticated supply chain involving thieves, handlers, and exporters uncovered
In a significant crackdown on the UK's phone theft epidemic, the Metropolitan Police have dismantled a sophisticated criminal network exporting nearly half of the mobile devices stolen on Britain's streets. The two-day sting operation, codenamed "Echosteep," involved over 300 officers raiding 28 homes across London to arrest groups of pickpockets and robbers behind the £70 million a year crisis.
At the heart of the operation were two Afghan gang leaders, codenamed "Heron" and "Seagull," who were apprehended while transporting a bundle of stolen phones wrapped in foil to block their tracking signals. The pair are believed to have shipped 40,000 devices to China and Hong Kong, fueling the nationwide phone theft crisis.
The operation was sparked by a chance discovery on Christmas Eve at Heathrow Airport, where nearly 1,000 stolen phones were found destined for Hong Kong. This led detectives to uncover a three-tier criminal structure, from street-level thieves to middlemen handlers and the top-level exporters like Heron and Seagull.
The Met's commissioner hailed Echosteep as the "biggest counter-mobile phone theft operation ever in the UK and probably in the world," predicting it would make a "huge dent" in the epidemic of phone snatches across the capital.
