Mini-Thief Packed in Luggage Robbing Swedish Buses

[muriel_volestrangler]

(don't think this has been posted before)

A gang of thieves is employing Trojan Horse tactics by smuggling a 'short person' -- a dwarf or child -- on Swedish buses inside a large bag in order to ransack other bags in the luggage compartment.

Thieves are believed to have been robbing Swedish coaches by smuggling a "short person" into luggage compartments inside a large bag, the coach operator said on Tuesday.
...
He said the person is believed to have been smuggled onto the coach in a hockey equipment bag.

One woman travelling from the town of Vasteras to Stockholm reported seeing two men squeezing a large, heavy bag into the luggage space under the bus. After arriving she found a camera, purse and other items missing.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/0,1518,530280,00.html

Ingenious. All the more reason to keep anything valuable with you, or have really good locks on luggage that can't be slit open.

[soleft]

1. How much room can there be in a bus baggage compartment?

Even if the person is small. Also, I would imagine people taking the bus probably don't have the kind of loot that people might pack if they were travelling by plane. Unless it's a tourist bus maybe.

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. They're at least 3 feet high, extend the entire width of the bus

and can be up to 20 feet long, I'd say. Full size people can crawl around in them quite easily. Being small, or a child, just means someone can lift the bag they're smuggled inside.

Could be a tourist bus, or an airport transfer bus, or people in Sweden take the bus more, since it's better for the environment than flying.

[east texas lib]

3. And that is...

The long and short of it.