Police nets 9 for breaking into Malawi cotton company premises
Nine people are in Police custody at Balaka Police Station for allegedly breaking into Malawi Cotton Company warehouses and went away with assorted pesticides and chemicals valued to K6.5 million.
Balaka police publicists Joseph Sauka says the suspects who are aged between 18 and 34 broke into Malawi Cotton warehouses where they stole about 180 cartons of assorted pesticides and chemicals for different crops.
He says after stealing, the criminals also went away with the locks for the warehouses and locked the warehouses with their own locks.
“Nobody discovered that the warehouses were broken into until the 17th of this month when they were doing inspection that officials noticed that the warehouses were tampered with after noticing that the locks which were there were different to what the company uses; and this made them to report the matter to Balaka Police who visited the scene and discovered that the warehouses were indeed broken into,” says Sauka.
Meanwhile, Police have arrested nine suspects who have confessed to have broken into the warehouse and have also recovered some items including a 3 tonner lorry registration number BR 1866 which was used in carrying the stolen items.
Investigations have also revealed that the breaking was an organized one as security guards of the premises were involved and they all fled the area after the incident was discovered.
Meanwhile the Police is confident that it will arrest all the suspects as the investigations are going on smoothly.
The Police in Balaka is appealing to the general public not to buy stolen items if we are to deal with cases of this nature and said it is a serious offence to receive stolen items as it attracts a maximum sentence of fourteen years imprisonment if found guilty.
All the suspects come from the same district of Balaka except one who comes from Zomba district but resides in Balaka.
Tell us their names!