Bust of a Cell Phone Theft Gang in Buenos Aires
A gang of thieves , known as “pungas,” was recently apprehended by the Buenos Aires City Police while in the act of stealing from unsuspecting victims in the commercial district of the Flores neighborhood. When captured, they were found in possession of 14 stolen cell phones , belonging to multiple victims whom they had targeted within a matter of hours and in broad daylight.
The suspects include a 48-year-old Peruvian man and three Argentine women, two aged 26 and one aged 52 , according to police reports. Their modus operandi is not unusual: they acted in a coordinated manner, seeking high pedestrian traffic areas to spot their victims and carry out their thefts unnoticed.
The gang’s downfall came after they were spotted by operators at the Urban Monitoring Center (CMU) . Using security cameras positioned in the area, operators noticed two gang members , a man and a woman, engaging in suspicious behavior at Avenida Rivadavia, near the Miserere subway station.
Through real-time visual monitoring, the operators recognized these two as having participated in a cell phone robbery moments earlier at the intersection of Avenida Nazca and Bogotá. Immediate alerts were sent out to patrolling police forces, who swiftly moved to intercept the suspects.
Using detailed descriptions provided by the CMU, police successfully intercepted the two suspects near the subway station. At the same time, a key piece of information emerged from the monitoring center: the suspects were accompanied by two additional women , who had likely boarded the Line A subway train towards Plaza de Mayo immediately after the crime.
Realizing this new development, a tactical operation was launched in collaboration with specialized personnel from the Subways Division of Lines A and B. Officers waited on the appropriate platform for the train’s arrival, setting up a search effort to identify the accomplices based on video evidence and descriptions from the monitoring.
Eventually, the two women were located and arrested upon disembarking from the train. Following identification, police conducted searches and confirmed suspicions that both were involved in a series of public robberies.
Among the belongings of the suspects, police recovered 14 cell phones of various brands , allegedly stolen during different incidents executed with the punga tactic in high-traffic areas. A preliminary investigation indicates that all these devices were likely taken the same day, within only a few hours.
Following the arrests, an investigation was initiated, and the National Criminal and Correctional Court No. 35 , overseen by Judge Osvaldo Rappa , authorized the detention of the gang members and the confiscation of the recovered devices.
The four suspects are now detained at the 3 A neighborhood police station . They are facing charges under the case labeled as “investigation of illicit activity,” while authorities work to identify potential victims and trace the origins of the stolen cell phones.