AYUTTHAYA: At least four thieves were involved in the theft of 2.4 million baht from two ATMs in Wang Noi district, police said on Friday.
Investigators obtained closed-circuit television images taken along the escape route and observed a pickup truck similar to the one that was found burned on a local road beside an irrigation canal, about 5 kilometres from the scene of the crime, around 5am Friday.
The incident took place in an area in front of a restaurant in tambon Lam Sai, where two ATM machines were cut open late Thursday night.
Thieves used a gas-fuelled torch to cut open a Bangkok Bank ATM and took cash totalling 2.4 million baht from three cash boxes, said police. They then forced open the first steel door of a Siam Commercial Bank ATM but stopped cutting the inner door when a woman arrived at the area.
The woman, whose name was withheld, provided useful information, said the investigators. At least four men were involved, she told them.
Closed-circuit TV cameras at the bank machines did not capture the incident as the thieves had turned them in another direction. However, CCTV footage along the escape route captured two vehicles -- one similar to the burned pickup and the other a white car, said officers.
The pickup had no licence plates and had been abandoned and set on fire on a local road leading to the Ayodhya Links golf course near an irrigation canal in tambon Wang Sai, said Pol Col Ekkarat Ouncharoen, chief of the Wang Noi station.
A search found several empty ATM cash boxes dumped behind nearby bushes.
Crime scene tape cordons off the two ATMs hit by thieves overnight in Wang Noi district of Ayutthaya. (Photo by Sunthorn Pongpao)
Empty cash boxes are retrieved from roadside bushes and an irrigation canal in Wang Noi. (Photo by Sunthorn Pongpao)