trucker links to original article
(Sabah Newspaper, 4 August 2013)
Creative thinking continues in jail.
Two security guards who turned themselves into authorities
four months after stealing 7.5 million Euros belonging to banks
in Gaziantep, have bewildered police with their explanation:
"We hitchhiked a ride on a truck and the trucker grabbed all the
money and took off. For months we looked for the truck and the
money but when we couldn't find them we turned ourselves in."
The police didn't find these statements believable and have
intensified their investigation.
Mehmet Vatan (33) worked for an Istanbul-based security firm
and on 29 March, while taking the money he had collected from
banks in Gaziantep, he distracted his partner M.A. and disappeared
with all the money. Police determined that Vatan escaped with his
friend Gokhan Arnavut, also a security guard. The two showed up
four months later, on 30 July, at the Gaziantep courthouse, telling
the incredulous police and prosecutor that they had lost all the money.
Vatan, the father of two who worked for the firm for six years,
explained what happened: "While I was collecting the money in I lost
my head and decided to steal it. Then I called Gokhan and we put
the money in a car he borrowed and escaped. I was going to buy a
car for 17,000 Euros but the seller changed his mind. Then Gokhan
had to return his car so we were left without one."
"We started to hitchhike and got a ride with a trucker going to
Mersin. Just before getting to Adana we took a break and went into
a restaurant. But the trucker, who said his name was Murat, didn't
follow us. When we came out the truck and the driver were gone
and so was the bag full of money."
Arnavut added that "we looked for the white truck for a month and
a half but we didn't know its plate number, only that it was headed
for Mersin. Having spent the 17,000 Euros we had put in our pockets,
we came and turned ourselves in."
Both Vatan and Arnavut were arrested and the police and prosecutor,
not buying the "we lost the money" explanation, are continuing their
investigation.
Gaziantep