Movie-like 'Seokyu Dodukdeul' Caught... Gang Stole 2.1 Billion Won Worth of Oil by Inserting 'Straws' into Pipeline

A movie-like crime where a tunnel was dug and a so-called ‘straw’ was inserted into an oil pipeline to siphon oil to a location 300 meters away actually took place. All eight ‘oil thieves’ were caught.

The Gyeongbuk Provincial Police Agency announced on the 3rd that they arrested eight professional thieves and fence operators who stole oil worth 2.1 billion KRW, charging them with violating the Oil Pipeline Safety Management Act, and sent five of them to prosecution in custody.

A pipeline equipped with facilities for extracting oil. [Image source=Gyeongbuk Police Agency]

According to the police, six members of the gang rented a fuel storage facility at a gas station in Gyeongbuk from July last year to April this year. They drilled a hole into an oil pipeline buried 2 meters underground along a national highway about 300 meters away and connected a high-pressure hose to steal 1.21 million liters of oil (worth about 2.1 billion KRW).

Additionally, two fence operators are suspected of distributing the oil, which they knew was secretly siphoned from the pipeline, to gas stations in Daegu, Gyeongbuk, Daejeon, and Chungnam.

The gang divided roles among the mastermind, facility installation technicians, oil theft workers, and fence distributors. During this process, the mastermind meticulously carried out the theft by preventing members from knowing each other’s identities.

It was also confirmed that in July last year, when they began the crime, some oil leaked near the fuel storage facility during their operation, causing soil contamination in the surrounding area.

The police received intelligence that “professional oil pipeline thieves recently released from prison are continuing the same crimes” and proceeded with the investigation.

Crime scene location. [Image source=Gyeongbuk Police Agency]

Since there was a possibility of large-scale soil contamination or fire during the oil leakage, the police quickly raided the crime scene, arrested the mastermind, and secured evidence. Subsequently, suspects who fled the scene were all caught along with the fence operators after a persistent month-long investigation.

During the arrest process, approximately 50 million KRW of criminal proceeds were seized from the mastermind, Mr. A, and 125,000 liters of oil (worth about 200 million KRW) stored in the fuel storage facility were confiscated and returned to the Korea Oil Pipeline Corporation.

A representative of the Gyeongbuk Police Violent Crime Investigation Unit said, “With the cooperation of the Korea Oil Pipeline Corporation, we safely restored the crime tools installed on the oil pipeline near the crime site, and notified the relevant local government so that restoration measures can be taken for the soil contamination that occurred.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.