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Losing something that you treasure most is an agonising experience. This happened to my son, Fadhli last week when the hard-earned personal property he treasured most disappeared within a matter of hours.
Fadhli (left) with friends in Putrajaya
After work he visited his friend at USJ 10, USJ, Subang Jaya and parked his car outside a friend’s apartment. At approximately 21:00 HRS he left his friend’s apartment heading for home. Upon reaching a place where he parked his car, he was shocked to see his car was nowhere within the vicinity of the parking area. Being a sportsman, he managed to compose himself and controlled the situation quite well. Firstly he informed his friend he just visited about the incident and called his brother to pick him up to lodge a police report at the nearby Balai Polis USJ 8.
My son worked hard to save money for the down payment of his first car. He bought the car about three months ago after having enough money for the down payment. Prior to having the car he was using his motorbike for work, where as usual the mother gets worry everyday about the safety of her son riding a motorbike enduring the rain & shine and busy roads from Bangsar to Subang Jaya. Finally the mother’s worries ended when he bought his first car none other than the most affordable brand new car in town, the Proton Saga Aeroback. The fun and enjoyment of driving his new car ended abruptly last week when his car went missing suspected of theft.
Inside the missing car was another most treasured possession of his, i.e. his sport bicycle which cost him about RM6, 000.00. Being a cyclist, losing a car is hard enough pain to endure but losing a sport bicycle was indeed an agonising experience. He was supposed to participate in a tournament at A’Famosa, Melaka last weekend but he had to forego the idea. Anywhere he went to Melaka with his friend just as a spectator.
He lodged a Police report at the nearby Balai USJ 8 and the Investigating Officer (I.O) assigned to his case was Sgt Azlan Sabtu. Being an experienced IO, Sgt Azlan knows his stuff well and the first thing he did was to confirm with MPSJ (Majlis Perbandaran Subang Jaya) Towing Division whether the car was towed away by the authority due to the indiscriminate parking. The answer was negative. Subsequent to that Sgt Azlan paged the MPV (Mobile Patrol Vehicle) within his area of command to look out for the vehicle. At the same time he input the vehicle details into the PDRM IT System that can be accessed both by PDRM and JPJ online. The idea is to facilitate online checking of missing or stolen vehicles in the event of the recoveries of the suspected stolen vehicles by the Police.
As usual a standard security protection system made available by Proton to the vehicle was the alarm system. On top of that my son asked the vendor to sand-blast the chassis and car registration numbers on the wind-screen of the vehicle.
Way down in Bandaraya Bersejarah Melaka, Cpl Mohamad Hakem and his team was conducting routine patrolling duties in a mobile patrol vehicle (MPV) around Melaka Sentral when they noticed a new Proton Saga Aeroback with an old Melaka registration number parked at the Melaka Sentral parking area. For an experienced policeman like Cpl Mohamad Hakem, such situation warranted him to probe further. He checked on the vehicle and his hunch was right.
The vehicle road tax disc (pic) was severely damaged (peeled off) and upon checking for other clues, Cpl Mohamad Hakem noticed the sand-blasted car registration number was different from the one attached to the front and rear of the vehicle (pic). Following the standard operating procedure (SOP), Cpl Mohamad Hakem and his team covertly observed the vehicle for one hour for any suspicious person(s) approaching the vehicle. The result was negative.
Cpl Mohamad Hakem and his team further checked the condition of the vehicle and they found out that the vehicle was unlocked and there was a key attached to the car ignition system. Cpl Mohamad Hakem used the key to start the engine and it worked. He took the car to Balai Polis, Melaka Tengah to be processed further.
Upon reaching his office, Cpl Mohamad Hakem checked with the PDRM IT System and he found out that vehicle was reported stolen in Selangor. He contacted Sgt Azlan, the IO assigned to the case and subsequent to that Sgt Azlan informed my son about the recovery of his car and asked my son to go to Melaka to verify and confirmed that the recovered vehicle was his. The very next day, last Friday, I accompanied my son to Melaka to meet Cpl Mohamad Hakem for confirmation and verification purposes.
With all the documentations available, the verification was simple and since the car did not suffer major damage, Cpl Mohamad Hakem allowed my son to take back the vehicle to be surrendered to the IO, Sgt Azlan of Balai Polis USJ 8.
It took only four days after the vehicle was reported stolen in Selangor, the Melaka Police recovered the vehicle in good condition. The fast recovery and identification of the vehicle was attributed to two important factors i.e. the efficiency of the patrolling policemen and PDRM IT System. No matter how good the IT System is if the human intervention is not there, the system would not be able to serve its purpose.
Kudos to Melaka and Selangor Police! The high level of efficiency and professionalism of the Police personnel particularly Sgt Azlan of Balai Polis USJ 8 and Cpl Mohamad Hakem of Balai Polis Melaka Tengah were indeed commendable. Knowing that my son was not familiar with Melaka town, Cpl Mohamad Hakem took the initiative to lead my son on his motorbike to the nearest petrol station. What more do you expect from a kind and helpful Police personnel like Cpl Mohamad Hakem! He really made my son’s day. The courtesy of Cpl Mohamad Hakem was enough to make the pain and agony my son has to endure for the past few days disappeared.
What do we learned from the above incident? A lot actually.
1. If you are in the same predicament, trust the Police. Trust me, the Police knows what they are doing;
2. Engage additional security protection to your vehicle such as steering lock, gear lock, etc;
3. If you have to park your car at night, choose a well-lit area and near to the public area;
4. Service your vehicle in a trusted workshop; if you owned a Proton car do not send your vehicle to a workshop not approved by Proton. Even if the workshop is Proton approved, make sure your vehicle key is securely kept by the workshop personnel. It is recommended that you wait at the workshop until the completion of the servicing
5. Sand-blast the car registration number and chassis number on the windscreen, no matter what’s the age of your car. The sand-blasting of the registration number on the windscreen would facilitate fast identification by the Police and other law enforcement agencies;
6. Make sure to retrieve any documents, letters, envelopes, etc that bear your name and address from your vehicle before servicing or washing your car. Once someone gets hold of your address, the next step will be easier. Just be careful.
What happened to my son’s car was quite straight forward. The car key was cloned or duplicated. By whom? Only one suspect i.e. the workshop personnel. They are the only people who have access to the car key. My son never sends his car for washing. He did his own washing at home. So be careful to which workshop / car wash you send your car for servicing or washing.
1 comment:
That was indeed a swift action taken by the authority. Although we have an increasing rate of crime, we cannot put the blame solely on the police; they are not the root of the problems. They are actually efficient, and this case of yours is a very good example.
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