SALON

No good Samaritan: Swedes shocked by subway thief

Topics: From the Wires,

No good Samaritan: Swedes shocked by subway thiefA composite image from September 8 CCTV footage made available by Swedish Police on Wednesday, Sept. 12, 2012, shows the victim, returning home after a drunken night on the town, falling down on the tracks at Sandsborg metro station south of Stockholm. He was then robbed and left to be run over by an oncoming train. The man survived, sustaining serious injuries. (AP Photo/Swedish Police) SWEDEN OUT (Credit: AP)

STOCKHOLM (AP) — A drunk, middle-aged man falls off a subway platform and is knocked unconscious as his head hits the tracks.

A bystander who witnessed the accident jumps down after him — but not for a daring rescue before the train arrives.

Instead, the witness steals the man’s valuables, climbs back on the platform and leaves his victim to be hit by a train.

The man — who was on his way home from a party — survived, but was seriously injured and doctors had to amputate half his left foot, Sweden’s TV3 channel reported.

Swedish police now hope that surveillance camera footage of the disturbing incident at a Stockholm subway station early Sunday will help them find and arrest the unscrupulous thief.

Police said Thursday they have received several tips after the video was shown on TV3 this week on Sweden’s equivalent to “America’s Most Wanted.”

It was also shown by several other TV stations.

“To me it’s incredible that one could steal or rob from somebody who is lying in such a place where you know that, if I don’t do something, then this person will, in a worst-case scenario, get killed by the train that is coming. Because the train is going to come,” police inspector Dan Ostman told TV4.

The thief had short, dark hair and was wearing a blue jacket and dark pants. He was described as being between 35 and 40 years old and about 5-foot-9 (175 centimeters).

He calmly walked out of the subway station, waving to the ticket vendor, as a train ran over the victim on the tracks below.

Next Article

Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Comments

0 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>