The escape plan of a group of 15 youths who robbed a shop in Flemish Brabant on Saturday evening was foiled when the train they were planning on taking to flee the nearby crime scene was stopped from leaving the platform until police arrived.
The group of youths, who had reportedly been hanging around near the train station earlier that evening, entered the shop on Statiestraat in Ternat at around 7:15 PM, just before the shop was supposed to close.
“Just before the arrival of a train, the young people rushed into the newspaper shop," Mayor Michel Vanderhasselt told Radio 2.
“They took chips, drinks, cookies, ice creams and sweets,” said the owner of the store, who added that “before I realised what was happening, they were already gone. It all happened very fast. "
The group’s plan was to jump on a train at the nearby station that was leaving at 7:29 PM, explains Nieuwsblad.
However, the owner of the store ran after the group and alerted a supervisor at the train station, who stopped the train from leaving and kept the doors of the train closed so nobody could come in or out.
The local police came to the scene and made several arrests. It is not yet clear exactly how many, but some perpetrators reportedly escaped on foot.
“This is a group of young people from the Dender region who often cause nuisance in Ternat. That was also the case last weekend in the Kruikenburg park in the centre of Ternat, when the group turned out to be carrying a baseball, iron bars and knives," Vanderhasselt explained.
Evie McCullough
The Brussels Times
