Thieves drive off with armored van

Thieves took away an undetermined amount of cash when they drove off in an armored van left unguarded outside a mall in Quezon City just before noon yesterday.

The suspects made off with the van (UFF-368) of the Royal Mandarin Security Agency in just five minutes, from the time security guards Leopoldo Daylosan Jr. and Zaldy Babaran left the vehicle at the mall entrance on Regalado Avenue to go to a bank in the mall and returned accompanying a teller carrying collected cash, said Superintendent Raymundo Equibal, commander of the Quezon City Police District Station 5.

Superintendent Antonio Yarra of the QCPD Criminal Investigation and Detection Unit said they have yet to determine the value of the loot as the establishments serviced by the armored van had yet to declare the amount of cash collected that day.

When the guards arrived at the spot where they parked the armored van, they were surprised to find that the vehicle had disappeared.

Equibal said the theft may have been an inside job, noting that Babaran and Daylosan both went into the mall and left the van unattended – a breach in security procedures.

Superintendent Bernabe Balba, QCPD Intelligence Division chief, said Babaran and Daylosan will be investigated to determine any liability on their part.

Balba said two to three men boarded the van before it left the mall.

According to Equibal, Babaran and Daylosan said they came across two men – one in a security guard uniform and another wearing a short-sleeved barong – leaving the mall as they left the armored van.

Balba said the armored van was abandoned along Mindanao Avenue Extension in Novaliches more than an hour later, with only coins left inside it.

Equibal said the suspects had destroyed the vault inside the van. He said it was still not clear whether the van was locked when Babaran and Daylosan left it behind.