Police have arrested a man believed to be the sole culprit in the theft of over four million riyals from ATM bank cash dispenser machines around the Jeddah region. The man is believed to have surreptitiously obtained secret numbers giving access to the outlets from two employees at the company responsible for replenishing the ATM machines. Suspicion has now been lifted from the two employees who were themselves held by the authorities last week accused of involvement in the theft. A company official at the time of their arrest described them as “new to the company staff”. Questioning of the pair gave police the new lead when it was revealed that they had been given training in how to replenish the cash machines by a man who was neither asked nor authorized to do so by the company for which the two worked. The individual in question was put under surveillance and finally arrested Monday for repeated thefts over a period of time. During interrogation the accused confessed to the crimes and led police to where he had kept the money. The money has, a police spokesman said, been returned to the ATM supply firm from which it was stolen. Police were called in two weeks ago after the unnamed company's own efforts to solve the mystery proved fruitless. The missing funds were first noticed after a shortfall was discovered at one ATM machine and inventories of other machines revealed that even greater amounts remained unaccounted for.
