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Police hunt 'criminal' chimp
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BBC Monday, 10 June, 2002 Police in London are hunting a chimpanzee they believe has broken into a flat and stolen a mobile phone and electrical equipment. Officers received reports of burglaries at 0745 BST and 0840 BST on Sunday at separate addresses in Gore Road, Hackney, east London. A Scotland Yard spokesman said: "Only small items of personal property, a mobile phone and parts of a stereo system, were stolen. Police dusted my flat for fingerprints - but how will that help catch a chimp? Victim, Gina Davidson "The caller of the second burglary confirmed to police he had seen an ape disappearing from the premises." Mustapha Riat said he had been woken in his ground-floor flat on Sunday morning to find a large figure with five-foot hairy arms towering over him. "I saw this hairy black chimpanzee coming through," the 43-year-old teacher told The Sun. "It was broad and muscular. I was frightened of being bitten."
'Greatest minds' The first raid had been just 20 doors away at a ground-floor flat belonging to Gina Davidson, according to The Sun. "The DVD player was moved and a watch missing," the 23-year-old told the newspaper. "Police dusted my flat for fingerprints - but how will that help catch a chimp?" The police spokesman said a fair at the nearby sprawling Victoria Park had been checked for apes but "they have not got any". "We have our greatest minds on this one," he said. Police said they did not disbelieve people who thought they had been woken up by a chimpanzee. They are looking for a suspect who is three-foot tall with a large amount of luxuriant dark hair. Officers are advising residents not to leave large bowls of bananas in prominent positions and to leave their windows closed.
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