A pickpocket distracts a man with sex: she and her accomplice grope his groin and his pockets.
Ego-stroking sex-based scams target vulnerable loners, or those who appear to be single. In a bar scene or come-on, some people suck up flirtation as if it were a windfall. Flattery becomes a white noise that all but drowns out warning bells. Bob and I watched in Barcelona while a working girl latched onto a man strolling along La Rambla. She pulled him into a shallow alcove and he couldn’t, or didn’t resist her handiwork. Both parties appeared to be into it until the woman’s groping fingers became light fingers. Coincidentally, the man’s wife and daughter caught up with him just then, too; he and his intimate thief were only two steps off the sidewalk. We have no idea how he explained the scenario and evidence of his willing participation to his family.
Sexy Pickpocket
In Prague last week, a woman used the same technique right in the lobby of the Marriott Hotel. She worked hard on one man, then serviced his eager friend as well while, of course, serving herself.
It was all over in two minutes. Marriott’s security camera caught the entire encounter. You’ve got to see the sexy pickpocket at work.
Two pickpockets look back at their angry intended victim.
When in Prague, Czech your Wallet
We hit the cobblestones as soon as we had dropped our bags and admired our room in King George’s House hotel, an atmospheric 14th century building in Prague’s Staré Mesto district. The late-summer crowd of budget tourists absorbed us into their mass migration. We surrendered to their pace, joining pudgy, reddened, middle-aged German men in sleeveless t-shirts and Birkenstocks with socks, tattooed skinheads wearing studded collars, and dizzy-eyed long-hairs whose sole employment seemed to be wrapping strands of hair in multi-colored thread.
Since pickpockets operate where tourists congregate, we allowed the happily drifting crowd to sweep us along the narrow lanes. It wasn’t easy to peel our eyes away from the intriguing marionette shops, enticing beer joints, and the renaissance-costumed concert touts. But our mission meant scrutinizing people, not souvenirs and architecture. We disciplined ourselves to study the throng and began to get used to the faces, rhythm, and tempo around us.
When we emerged into a sunny clearing, we found ourselves at the foot of Charles Bridge, a magnet for tourists. The many graceful arches of this medieval bridge step across the broad Vltava River to the Mala Strana area. Mala Strana is a popular pub and restaurant district, and a little further up the hill is Prague Castle. So Charles Bridge is heavy with pedestrian traffic all day and late into the night. Nestled among its 18th century statues, artists and craftsmen ply their wares and musicians play everything from classical to klezmer. The bridge is a destination itself.
Thiefhunting
The two women at left are pickpockets. The two boys at right are their stalls. The woman at center was the intended victim.
We realized at once that the square at the foot of Charles Bridge offered a unique opportunity for pickpockets. A street of wild traffic and speeding trams separates old town from Charles Bridge. Everyone wishing to get from one place to the other must cross the street here at a stoplight. Crowds of a hundred or more people, mostly tourists, quickly accumulate on both sides of the street. Pickpockets have ample time to locate a mark, get in position, and work them while they cross.
Pickpockets in Prague
An affectionate couple on the street corner caught our attention in a big way. When the light changed and the traffic paused, they crossed the busy street among a mob of gawking tourists. But three quarters of the way across the street they abruptly turned and crossed back to where they had begun.
In the “matador” position, the pickpocket (left) slings a coat on her shoulder when she’s ready to work. The coat blocks others from seeing her handiwork.
There they stood, again waiting to cross with the next gathering crowd. The man’s hand casually rested on the woman’s right shoulder. The woman had a blue blazer hanging from her left shoulder. They were better dressed than any of the summer tourists, but somehow didn’t quite look like local business people, either.
The woman sidled up to a man waiting to cross. The light changed. The pedestrians stepped off the curb and surged around the nose of a tram, which had come to a stop in the crossers’ territory.
The man shifted his hand to the woman’s left shoulder, where he anchored her blazer. The woman used her left hand to extend the blazer, completely shielding her work. As we all reached the opposite curb, I fought through the crowd and tried to speak with the elderly gentleman who was the woman’s target.
In Prague at the Charles Bridge crossing, pickpockets block their marks as they cross the street to slow them down.
“Where are you from?” I asked him.
“Greece,” his wife said. The man was old and hard of hearing.
“Does he have his wallet?” I asked.
The wife didn’t understand.
“Portofoli?” I asked, pointing to the old man’s pocket and hoping I remembered the correct Greek word for wallet.
The wife felt her husband’s pocket and looked up at me in alarm. I looked wildly around for the affectionate couple but they were gone. Thinking frantically for the Greek word for pickpocket, I tried Spanish and Italian. Finally, klepsimo. The woman understood, but why not—the wallet was gone. She hurried away from me before I could say anything else, as if I were the thief.
Two pickpockets look back at their angry intended victim.
The foot of Charles Bridge, in Prague, is alive with movement. People come and go, lounging and looking, snapping pictures, sipping sodas, eager not to miss a thing on their own personal agendas. Souvenir kiosks attract tight knots of tourists who admire glass animals, wooden puppets, and mad-hatter hats. The corner concert hall, advertising afternoon Mozart recitals, employs a pair of mimes to pass out pamphlets and harass the public.
Bob and I were staking out a pair of well-dressed women with two teenage boys. One of the women carried a blazer slung over one shoulder. As we surreptitiously observed the foursome, we pantomimed the restless and fidgety movements of people waiting for tardy friends, impatiently glancing at our watches and scanning the streets. Simultaneously, we strained to see over and around the milling mob.
The team showed us thievery in motion. As pedestrians waited to cross, the young boys, the stalls, positioned themselves in front of the target victim chosen by the women. The light changed, the crowd surged, and—
Two tousle-headed whitefaces were thrust under our noses. Painted lips grinned over ruffled collars. The pesky mimes had snuck up on us and began to make a scene, flitting around us like butterflies. They mimicked our waiting charade, tapping their toes and drumming their fingers on air. Unaware that theirs was a copy of a copy, the duo performed their inauthentic imitation with self-satisfaction. The pickpocket team crossed the street while the mimes were in our faces, blocking our view and making a nuisance of themselves.
We needn’t have worried about missing the demonstration; we were treated to numerous repetitions of the same choreography. A new crowd of pedestrians gathered and the team members took up their places. With the boys positioned in front of their chosen, the women closed in behind the mark. When the light changed, the boys stepped off the curb, then hesitated—stalled—causing the mark to bump into them. The women naturally crashed into the mark and, in the moment of physical contact, dipped into the victim’s pocket.
Over half an hour, as they repeated their scripted moves, the two women occasionally lifted their heads to scan the crowd but, for the most part, they laughed, chatted, and gently scolded the boys as they worked. They appeared as natural and at ease as every other individual on the square, and possessed the intersection as confidently as did the mimes. Nothing would give them away to the casual observer, unless one noticed that they never left the intersection. What tourist, or local for that matter, crosses and recrosses the same street, again and again?
I used the words choreography and scripted moves, which usually do not apply to opportunists. While this outfit utilized a minor strategy, I wouldn’t call them strategists. They went for the easy marks, made many efforts, and had a high rate of failure. They didn’t invest much in each set-up and were rarely noticed by a newly replenished crowd.
The two women at left are pickpockets. The two boys at right are their stalls. The woman at center was the intended victim.
Often, the team targeted women with large handbags. Under the cover of the jacket-tool, they delicately dipped and groped for treasure. We saw them get nabbed twice in that half hour. Once, when they crossed late, the foursome got stuck on the narrow median strip with their victim. Trapped together, the victim and her husband accused the women in German. Cars, trucks, and trams careened wildly around them. Appearing frustrated, the victim repeatedly opened the flap of her own bag, demonstrating what she knew the two women had done. The thieves pretended ignorance and refused to respond.
When the light finally changed and the opponents were freed from their traffic island prison, they stormed off in opposite directions. Bob and I caught up with the victim and learned that nothing had been stolen. But she had felt a hand in her purse. She was alert, she was quick, and she was furious.
So many gangs like these prey on visitors to Prague that, combined with well-known taxi scams and restaurant overcharges, the city’s reputation for tourism has been seriously damaged.
Group tour leader Graham Bell, of London, traveled to Prague with a group of 21. Of those, nine were pickpocketed. Nine who left themselves open to opportunists—a totally unnecessary state. Bob and I would encourage any of our readers to visit Prague for it’s stunning beauty—you will go prepared.
Thieves in Prague: the three front center will get what the taxis don't.
After an eventful overnight train journey we were disgorged into a very foreign Sunday morning. Not a single sign in Prague’s main train terminal was in friendly English, or any other language we could make out; not even an exit sign. The station was haunted by solitary figures standing, smoking, watching, waiting. It took us half an hour to find a dismal tourist information booth. The grouchy attendant, stingy with his every word, pushed a map at us through a slit in his glass barrier and considered himself done. Averse to bribing a public servant, we persisted with our questions, formulating the same query in endless shapes. Finally, we extracted this gem: taxi fare to our hotel ought to be two hundred koruna, about six dollars.
The taxi drivers had something else in mind.
“Meter,” they said, “more fair.”
Our bags were loaded into the trunk and we got in.
“About how much,” we asked.
“Meter,” the driver insisted. Again we pressed for an estimate, and the driver finally said seven hundred. Seven hundred! Out we got, and out with our bags. The driver said something to the other waiting taxi drivers, and we were certain we wouldn’t get a ride from any of them. So we walked.
A few blocks down the street we flagged down a passing taxi. He too, suggested the meter. We said c’mon, about how much. Three hundred, he said. Okay. We watched the meter start spinning. No way was it a legal spin. As the meter crept to four hundred, we protested, and the driver agreed to a flat three hundred.
“The taxi drivers wanted seven hundred koruna!” I exclaimed in outrage to the hotel receptionist.
“They are thieves,” was his simple reply.
But they were not the thieves we were interested in.
