Pawn shop employee arrested for allegedly swapping real jewellery with fake items

KUALA LUMPUR: A 31-year-old pawn shop worker was arrested by the police for allegedly trying to swap gold jewellery with fake items.

Gombak OCPD Asst Comm Arifai Tarawe said police received a report from the pawn shop operator last Thursday (Aug 6).

"Based on his report, he claimed one of his staff took out two gold bracelets and a gold necklace and exchanged them with fake gold items. We arrested the woman in the evening on the same day at her home at Taman Sri Gombak," he said.

ACP Arifai added that the gold items were worth around RM5,200, saying that the investigation revealed that the suspect had been working at the shop since June 23, and did not have a prior criminal record.

"The shop operator realised something was amiss after inspecting the three items and realised that they were not real gold. We managed to recover one of the gold bracelets from a pawn shop in Terengganu, while another bracelet was recovered from a pawn shop in Sri Gombak," he said.

ACP Arifai added that the third item recovered was a gold chain found at the suspect's home.

He said they have referred the investigation papers to the deputy public prosecutor's office and hope to charge the suspect soon.