With a knife and gun believed to be a fake, this man in a pink turban ordered staff at the ValueMax pawnshop outside Boon Lay MRT Station to hand over cash and jewellery on Saturday (28 July).
The man had entered the shop at around 4.30pm, and demanded the valuables from staff at the counter.
Hearing the commotion, the shop manager went to the counter to deal with the “difficult customer”.
That’s when he realised his shop was being robbed by a bandit who appeared to be carrying a gun.
The manager told the press that even though the situation was tense, he remained calm and analysed the situation, and determined that the gun was a fake.
“He asked for money. I told him there’s no money here. Then he seemed lost and didn’t know what to do. He only showed a small part of the gun, and looked like he didn’t dare to show the whole thing. Later, he pulled out a knife. I thought that if since he had a gun, he wouldn’t need a knife, so the gun must be fake.”
Commenting on the incident, a staff member said:
“The manager saw the ‘gun’ and knew it was fake, so he refused to hand over any of the valuables and said he would call the police. Then he shouted for help, hoping to attract attention of passes-by.”
Apparently, this crook was good at neither a life of crime, nor accepting rejection.
He flung a black object with exposed electrical wires on the counter top then fled the shop.
Seeing that the black object looked like a waist-belt which had explosives, the shop manager thought quickly and threw the waist-belt out of the store – towards the entrance of Boon Lay MRT station and a pedestrian square in front of Jurong Point mall lined with cafes where human traffic was high.
Police subsequently arrived and cordoned off Exit C of the MRT station and the pedestrian square.
The “explosives waist-belt” was later established to be an object that contained “some electrical components”.
The incident had been classified as an offence under the Arms Offences Act.
Police are on the hunt for the suspect, who has been described as about 1.75m tall and last seen wearing a pink turban, blue jacket, and long brown trousers.
If you see anyone resembling the crook, call the police hotline at 1800 255 0000.
