Woman abducted in Oberbort-Gstaad

On Monday evening February 18 around 18h10, a woman was attacked and abducted from the sidewalk on the Palacestrasse by three masked men. She was walking in the direction of the Palace up the hill from the village when a car pulled up behind her, the men jumped out, and pushed her into the car. The victim, an American tourist staying at the Palace, lost her handbag in the struggle, which was later found on the sidewalk, and the car drove off at high speed in the direction of Rougemont. During the journey the men stole jewelry from the victim as well as the shopping that she was carrying at the time of the attack, before pushing her out of the vehicle. Shaken but otherwise uninjured, she was able to alert police, who immediately launched an unsuccessful search of the immediate vicinity. The men are described as French-speaking with dark hair, and were driving a silver station wagon. Police are appealing for witnesses, particularly those who may have seen the getaway car speeding in or around the Gstaad tunnel at around 18h15, or anyone who may have noticed the three men around Gstaad. The police can be reached on 033 356 84 31.

UPDATE: police believe they have found the car used in the attack. Last Wednesday morning, a completely burnt out silver SUV was found in Leysin. The plates matched those of a Mazda CX7 (similar to the one pictured left) stolen on February 16 from Chermignon in Wallis (VS). A number of witnesses had reported seeing an Audi Q7 at the time of the attack, and police note that these two cars are not dissimilar in appearance. Now police would like to speak with anyone who may have been the Maxda CX7 between Feb16 and Feb20 (it may have had either VS or VD plates). Click the photo to enlarge it, and call the Kantonspolizei on 031 634 44 11 if you know anything.

Comments

[victim]

what do you expect? useless cops,zero security and complacency.
gstaad is swarming with unsavoury characters from the balkans for whom a stay in a swiss prison is like a 5-star picnic.
come on gstaad,wake-up!

[Nishant Singh]

Think its time to invest in street camera's. Apart from acting as a deterent, it will provide vital clues in such, for example car number, exact build of assailants, etc. While we're at it, don't miss the stations. Last year, my laptop bag was stolen and authorities did nothing more than blame the Italians.

[Filipa]

Yes, it'awfull to disturb such a beautiful place. It must be Albanians from Kosovo!

[victim]

filipa : great minds think alike!
thanks for your empathy.

[carlo vg]

The racial innuendo does nothing to solve the problem and serves only to mislead an already confused local police.
What we need is proper cops, not traffic wardens that only seem interested in filling the local coffers through parking tickets.
Cameras are only good after the incidents have occurred, they are not a deterrent unless you have round the clock monitoring and an interactive real-time action by the police, something not likely to happen. Too many cameras and a corresponding amount of cops would be needed to cover such a wide and diversified area to be of any use.
In the event there may be rotten apples with local ties they will tend to fool the local police. During the high seasons, local cops should do support work - rather than on the field one - for they know what hides behind the grapevine and should not be put on the spot to be antagonized by the villagers.
What we need is prevention through specialized, non-local cops, who are on the lookout and taking the rounds - rather than applying traffic and parking fines - at all times of the day, especially during the high seasons (Christmas, February, Tennis and August).

[rhodesia]

the cops have the usual 0900-1200/1400-1800. excluding weekends and public holidays.
there is NO 24/24 7/7 policing so these hoods got their timing right because @ 1810 all the cops had already gone into sleep mode.
no wonder that all the major crimes in gstaad have been committed out-of-hours;
none of the major crimes have been solved so let us face it : they are no good at prevention,detection nor solving.
they really do not look motivated,just glorified traffic wardens,really.

[Anonymous]

There are already police cameras at the tunnel and at Wally's. How would more cameras have helped in this last situation, short of someone watching the camera's contents all day? Even with recordings, all that would be have been shown was the license plate of a stolen car and 3 masked men... how would have cameras have helped?

[rhodie]

agree with anonymous.
more police with brains,brawn and balls!

[Keith Jenkins]

Hmm, my first thought would be to look closer at the guest, they pull some funny moves nowadays. How much was the insurance claim for? that would tell us something. I 've offered to patrol the village on the wages of a cleaner, didn't get anywhere though. And I'm hard-core!!. I really like Gstaad. I'd do anything to help. They just aren't with it. I suppose they don't want to admit the realities, who on earth can blame them for not wanting to see beloved Gstaad getting uglied. Count me in if anyone has an idea or influence. I've got dogs, k.jenkins@swissmail.org and plus it would be easy to recover from the present position. DON'T MAKE the too little too late mistake

[Local]

Does it really suprise you that there are criminals getting attracted by a hill which stinks of money as much as Oberbort?

If you suggest CCTV, well, then you might have to think about where all the GreenGo crowd is going to buy their cocaine supply instead, because that might well be recorded on tape then, as well...

I think the local police turns a blind eye on those guests and Chalet owners who stretch the law much more than any of the locals, let alone Albanian asylum seekers.

Get real.