Police in Delhi, India, have arrested a 40-year-old man on charges of theft in an unusual case that saw wealthy air passengers targeted as victims.
The detained man, Rajesh Kapoor, was arrested on 13 May 2024, in the Paharganj area of the capital, after a police investigation into a series of thefts that would grace the plot of a closed-room mystery movie. Kapoor is accused of stealing jewellery and other valuables from overhead cabins on aircraft – not on just one journey but over the course of many.
Two thefts led to the suspect
Speaking about the investigation and arrest at a press conference at Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGI), Deputy Commissioner of Police Usha Rangnani told media that a specialist airport police team had been tasked with the case, after two thefts were reported on different flights in April and February this year, with jewellery worth over ₹27 lakh (nearly 30,000 euros) taken.
During the police operation, CCTV surveillance footage was inspected and passenger manifests were compared. A flyer listed on both flights was identified, but it emerged he had provided fake contact details to the airlines involved, booking his ticket under the name of his own dead brother – an aspect of the story that seems designed to add emotive colour. Eventually, however, the police were able to track the right suspect down.
It is unclear if Kapoor is the same man named in a 2019 Times of India report for suspected involvement in deception, impersonation, and theft on trains and again at IGI Airport. Another man, named Sharad Jain, 46, has been arrested in Karol Bagh in central Delhi, accused by police of being the accomplice who would receive and sell the stolen goods.
Elderly women targeted
They found that over twelve months, Kapoor had spent 110 days in transit and had taken at least 200 flights. Since his arrest and interrogation, he has confessed to five instances of theft and is implicated in 11 others.
The modus operandum, police say, was to strategically book tickets to travel on “premium domestic flights, notably Air India and Vistara, bound for destinations like Delhi, Chandigarh, and Hyderabad.” During these flights, Kapoor would home in on vulnerable, elderly passengers, mostly women, who might be likely to keep valuables in their hand luggage when flying.
Under cover of the distractions of the boarding process, Kapoor would rummage around in overhead cabins and handbags to find goods worth stealing. Occasionally he requested seat changes, in order to be closer to his potential victims, police said.
