People all across Indonesia woke up early yesterday to check out the solar eclipse that was visible over much of the country. Thousands reportedly gathered around Planetarium Jakarta in Taman Ismail Marzuki (TIM) to watch the rare astronomical event together with fellow enthusiasts. Unfortunately any event that draws that kind of crowd is bound to attract a few criminals as well, and not even the eclipse crowd outside the Planetarium was safe from the sticky fingers of a thief using the moon covering up the sun as cover for his dirty work.
Ilham, a 26-year-old astronomy fan, had come to TIM that morning along with his girlfriend and a telescope through which to view the eclipse. While he was gazing up at the sky through his telescope, he felt something push up against him and immediately became suspicious.
“When I was watching the eclipse through the telescope, I felt someone push into me. At that time, not many people wanted to look through the telescope,” Ilham said on Wednesday as quoted by Kompas.
Ilham saw a man walking away from him and quickly realized that he had lost his mobile phone. He ran after the man and confronted him about his missing phone. The thief denied taking it so Ilham tried to get him to go to the nearest police station.
At that point the thief started to run away. Ilham shouted out “Thief!” to the crowd and bystanders proceeded to grab the criminal as he tried to make his getaway and then give him a beating until police arrived at the scene.
The thief, named Rahman, reportedly confessed to the crime at the Menteng Police Station and officers are investigating the possibility he was working with an accomplice.
