Thief bent double in bag presents police with open and shut case

A thief folded himself into a suitcase loaded onto a Spanish airport bus luggage compartment and then silently broke out to steal thousands of pounds worth of goods from other cases, it has emerged.

The man secreted himself in the bag and then allowed his partner in crime to board the bus from Girona airport to Barcelona, having handed over the suitcase to be stowed away.

The thief unzipped his suitcase, plundered the other bags and then climbed back in.

At the end of the 90-minute journey, his accomplice would simply take the suitcase with his partner inside and escape undetected.

Spanish police were baffled by travellers' repeated reports of items being stolen from bags on the journey, which they discovered only once they got to their destinations and opened up their bags.

But a passenger ended the s c a m when he pointed out a suspicious bag on one of the journeys. Police opened the bag and, to quote the Catalan police, "they saw there was a man doubled up almost like a contortionist."

The man had a mobile phone, a small bag and a sharp object to open zips and locks.

Officers boarded the bus and detained the man who had left the suitcase in the luggage compartment.

Travelmole hopes lessons are learnt and the flexible thief goes straight.

With permission from Travelmole