A group of audacious pickpockets stole the smartphone of Paris' chief of police while he was preparing to board a train, police sources said yesterday.
The thieves at the Gare de Lyon train station distracted Paris police prefect Michel Gaudin by asking him to sign a petition and swiped the mobile telephone from his pocket, sources told AFP. No sensitive information was contained in the phone, the sources said.
The embarrassing episode comes as the French Interior Ministry is in the midst of a campaign to raise public awareness of the growing risk of mobile telephone thefts.
Meanwhile, website thelocal.fr reported that Starbucks has withdrawn anti-pickpocketing posters from its stores in France even though it said people who found them to be racist were mistaken.
The poster featured a man with dark skin surrounded by arrows pointing to various objects.
Underneath the images, the text read: "Be on your guard against unusual behaviour from a stranger. Don't let pickpockets spoil your moment of relaxation at Starbucks. Keep an eye on your belongings."
A customer at a Paris Starbucks reported the poster to anti-racism group SOS Racisme. The group told the United States coffee company to remove the posters from stores, saying it "targeted a minority" and associated them with "delinquent behaviour".
A Starbucks representative said the poster was supposed to represent a customer, not a pickpocket. It has a similar poster featuring a white woman.
- AGENCIES