Chennai cops hunt for man who steals shoes

CHENNAI: City police are looking for a well-dressed man who had been stealing shoes placed in front of each apartment in big housing complexes and selling the same as new shoes at the Pallavaram weekly market.

The police had intensified the hunt for the shoe thief after they got CCTV footage of him from an apartment complex in Velachery. The footage shows the man, holding a shopping bag, climbing upstairs and aborting his plan midway to climb down after he hears the barking of dogs from the upper floor.

According to a resident of the apartment, the shoe thief retreated, smelling trouble after he heard the sound of a barking dog.

Police believe that the man targets people who casually leave their shoes outside the apartment, which is a common practice in the metro as many households believe that footwear should be taken inside the house. “So, the suspect found it easy to flick shoes and did it during the night,” police noted.

Based on a complaint to the control room about the ‘novel’ modus operandi, police team from Velachery station visited the apartment complex and conducted an inquiry after browsing through the CCTV footage there.