Thieves steal £450,000 worth of iPhones from moving truck

Reports says the five suspects could also be linked to 17 other high-speed robberies

iPhone heist
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Five Romanian men have been arrested in the Netherlands on suspicion of stealing £450,000 worth of iPhones from a moving lorry.

The men "allegedly stole the iPhones in a late-night raid a week ago by driving a modified van so close to the delivery truck that one of the suspects was able to clamber across", ABC News says.

They then broke into the truck "while it drove along a Dutch road", with one suspect passing the handsets "back to the van through a hole cut in its roof."

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The thieves were tracked down by authorities following "a year-long manhunt", says Gizmodo. They were found in the Dutch town of Otterlo.

Smartphone raids have occurred in several countries across Europe, reports The Guardian, although "there had been no arrests until now."

The five men accused of last week's heist have also been linked with 17 other truck robberies since 2015.

High-speed heists are not a new phenomenon, says BGR, with Romanian police releasing video footage of a truck robbery from 2012.

The video reveals an SUV pulling up behind a lorry, before someone emerges from the sunroof and begins to open the rear hatch of the truck.

In this case, however, the site says the thieves "bailed out after breaking the doors open".

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