An organised crop theft ring has resurfaced in villages around Laona in Paphos district, with women on quad bikes stealing produce and selling it immediately to waiting buyers, new police complaints reveal.
The scheme, first exposed by Phileleftheros last April, stopped for several months before starting up again recently, according to complaints filed to police and local officials.
Women working on farms and in other local businesses ride quad bikes into fields, steal crops and sell them on the spot to accomplices waiting nearby, the complaints state.
A farmland owner exposed the operation when she found a stranger on a quad bike in her field. The woman began taking photos with her mobile phone when spotted, the landowner told police.
Asked what she was doing on the property, the woman said she had stopped to photograph the surrounding area.
The landowner had already noticed large quantities of her crops cut and placed in bags next to the quad bike. When she left to alert relatives, a commercial vehicle pulled up with an unknown man, whom the woman approached with the produce.
The man gave her a €20 note. The woman reacted angrily and the buyer increased the amount to €40, took the produce and drove off.
The landowner photographed the quad bike before the woman left and filed a complaint. Other plantation owners have reported similar thefts, making clear the operation is organised, according to the complaints.
Residents also complained to local officials. MP Chrysanthos Savvides confirmed the complaints, describing an organised gang.
Residents and farmers in Drouseia and other areas say women on quad bikes break into farms, cut crops, and within minutes people arrive in vehicles, pay for the produce and disappear, he said.