Teh One Who Knocks
02-17-2020, 12:26 PM
By Yaron Steinbuch - The New York Post
https://i.imgur.com/2M4n18Ml.jpg
Armed robbers in Hong Kong held up a delivery driver in Hong Kong on Monday, wiping him clean of hundreds of rolls of toilet paper in a city facing acute shortages amid the coronavirus outbreak, according to reports.
“A deliveryman was threatened by three knife-wielding men who took toilet paper worth more than HK$1,000 ($130),” a police spokesman told Agence France-Presse.
Two suspects were later collared and the missing rolls recovered, though it was not immediately clear if they were involved in the TP caper outside a supermarket in the Mong Kok district, a police source told AFP.
Video broadcast by Now TV showed investigators milling around crates of toilet paper outside the Wellcome Supermarket in the district, which has a history of “triad” crime gangs.
Toilet rolls have become a hot commodity, with stores struggling to keep them in stock as residents make runs to clean them off the shelves during panic-buying sprees.
One woman passing by the scene of the heist told local TV station iCable that “I’d steal faces masks, but no toilet roll,” according to AFP.
Authorities in the financial hub — where there have been 58 confirmed cases of COVID-19, the official name of the illness – insist that the supply of household goods and foods remain stable, though face masks have been hard to come by.
And yet, images shared online have shown people hoarding toilet paper rolls in their tiny apartments – prompting officials to warn that they could develop mold in the humid climate.
The supermarket chain denounced the “senseless” robbery and called on residents not to buy toilet paper in bulk.
“We want to emphasize that we have sufficient toilet roll supply to meet demand,” Wellcome said in a statement. “The temporary shortage was caused by the sudden and unusual surge in demand.”
https://i.imgur.com/2M4n18Ml.jpg
Armed robbers in Hong Kong held up a delivery driver in Hong Kong on Monday, wiping him clean of hundreds of rolls of toilet paper in a city facing acute shortages amid the coronavirus outbreak, according to reports.
“A deliveryman was threatened by three knife-wielding men who took toilet paper worth more than HK$1,000 ($130),” a police spokesman told Agence France-Presse.
Two suspects were later collared and the missing rolls recovered, though it was not immediately clear if they were involved in the TP caper outside a supermarket in the Mong Kok district, a police source told AFP.
Video broadcast by Now TV showed investigators milling around crates of toilet paper outside the Wellcome Supermarket in the district, which has a history of “triad” crime gangs.
Toilet rolls have become a hot commodity, with stores struggling to keep them in stock as residents make runs to clean them off the shelves during panic-buying sprees.
One woman passing by the scene of the heist told local TV station iCable that “I’d steal faces masks, but no toilet roll,” according to AFP.
Authorities in the financial hub — where there have been 58 confirmed cases of COVID-19, the official name of the illness – insist that the supply of household goods and foods remain stable, though face masks have been hard to come by.
And yet, images shared online have shown people hoarding toilet paper rolls in their tiny apartments – prompting officials to warn that they could develop mold in the humid climate.
The supermarket chain denounced the “senseless” robbery and called on residents not to buy toilet paper in bulk.
“We want to emphasize that we have sufficient toilet roll supply to meet demand,” Wellcome said in a statement. “The temporary shortage was caused by the sudden and unusual surge in demand.”