委内瑞拉窃贼不偷钱包偷头发

在委内瑞拉第二大城市马拉开波，一个自称“食人鱼”的盗窃团伙专门将作案目标锁定为长发飘飘的女性，而他们要窃取的也不是她们的钱包，而是头发。他们偷来的头发一般都会卖给美发店做人工接发之用，质量上乘的头发能卖200英镑（约合人民币1900元）。该团伙一般选择购物中心为作案地点，一旦看到符合要求的作案目标，便用枪将其逼至一旁，要求受害人将头发扎成马尾，然后用刀片将头发割走。为了应对此类案件，该市已经在购物中心等案件高发地点增派了安全警卫人员，同时，该市市长也建议女性前往此类公共场所时尽量不要把长发披下来。

A group of Venezuelan thieves that calls itself 'The Piranhas' has turned its attention away from purses and pocketbooks, by holding women at gunpoint in order to steal their hair.

In Maracaibo, Venezuela's second largest city, the gang is targeting women whose flowing locks, once removed, can be made into natural hair extensions and sold to beauty salons.

The robbers operate by holding their victims at gunpoint and ordering them to tie their hair into a ponytail, before removing it with a razor blade.

Top quality stolen hair can fetch the equivalent of £200.

"The demand for hair extensions has risen by 30 percent since the crimes started", said Jhonatan Morales, a beauty salon owner who spoke to state television channel Globovision.

"The market is more competitive now. We judge the hair on its tone, condition and color", he said. "But my salon doesn't buy from street vendors as we don't know where the hair has come from".

"When they came up to me I thought they were going to take my phone", said Mariana Rodriguez, one of the gang's numerous victims. "But before I had time to think they were gone and I had no hair".

The city's response to the rise in hair theft has been to position guards in the shopping centers where the crimes have been most prevalent.

"We are responding with force to these escalating crimes", said Maracaibo's mayor Aveling de Rosales in a statement last Monday. "However, we recommend that women avoid wearing their hair down in public places as it facilitates the theft".

Maracaibo, a city of four million close to the Colombian border, is particularly prone to gang crime given the large amount of smuggling which occurs in the area.

Gang activity in the region is funded by the purchasing of basic goods such as lavatory paper and rice, the prices of which are heavily subsidized by Venezuela's government. The goods are then smuggled across the border into Colombia where they are sold for a profit at normal market rates.