A group of audacious pickpockets stole the smartphone of Paris' chief of police while he was preparing to board a train, police sources said yesterday.
The thieves at the Gare de Lyon train station distracted Paris police prefect Michel Gaudin by asking him to sign a petition and swiped the mobile telephone from his pocket, sources told AFP. No sensitive information was contained in the phone, the sources said.
The embarrassing episode comes as the French Interior Ministry is in the midst of a campaign to raise public awareness of the growing risk of mobile telephone thefts.
Meanwhile, website thelocal.fr reported that Starbucks has withdrawn anti-pickpocketing posters from its stores in France even though it said people who found them to be racist were mistaken.
The poster featured a man with dark skin surrounded by arrows pointing to various objects.
