RIO DE JANEIRO—Thieves and robbers have struck with impunity at the supposedly well-secured Olympics here, victimizing members of the media on several occasions.
Brazil’s Forca Nacional security apparatus, which provides security at the Games venues, is keeping mum on the crime surge but several reporters and photographers have complained of either being mugged and divested of cash or expensive equipment or of returning to lodging rooms already ransacked of valuables.
Thieves sneaked into the room of two television crew members of TV5 Kapatid network—Lia Cruz and Magoo Marjon—at the Media Village last Friday and took cash with a combined amount of $800.
The next day, six well-dressed men surrounded an Australian photographer near a venue in Olympic Park and forcibly took his cameras and other equipment worth a total of $40,000.
The mugging of the lensman, Brett Costello, was captured on closed-circuit television and uploaded on YouTube.
A couple of hours later, an Argentinian sports reporter was pulled by three men into a secluded corner of a narrow street near Rio’s Centro downtown and robbed of his money, laptop and mobile phones. The victim requested that he not be identified at this time.
A photographer for the Philippines sports website Spin.ph, Jerome Ascano, returned to his room one evening last week to find his suitcase forcibly opened. He said it was fortunate that he had already removed all his valuables and equipment when the attempted theft happened.
“The person or persons who entered my room and rummaged through my belongings clearly wanted only cash,” said Ascano. “They would have taken my camera lenses if I had left them there.”
Police have already arrested one of the men who robbed Costello in broad daylight. The veteran photographer helped catch the thief.