Victims were on the beach when they were ambushed by four pickpockets.
The attack was witnessed by a British citizen who recorded the video and shared it on social media.
Two foreign citizens, originally from Nepal, claim to have been victims of an armed robbery carried out by a group of four young pickpockets, on a beach in Funchal, on the night of Thursday to Friday.
The crime was reported by a British tourist who witnessed the incident and who was willing to give a statement to the PSP as part of the proceedings. The foreign citizen made a point of recording a brief conversation with the victims inside the Regional Command, at 1 am on Friday, a video of which he shared on social media as a form of warning.
In the post, one of the young men can be seen with a bloody face and a deep cut on his face. The two complained of having been attacked by a group of pickpockets, one of them armed with a knife.
According to the testimony, the two young brothers were on Funchal beach when they were surprised by four boys, aged between 18 and 19, who approached them in a threatening tone and with the intention of robbing them.
“They asked me to hand over my wallet, my cell phone, money and everything we had,” says one of the victims in the video recorded on a cell phone in the entrance hall of the PSP Regional Command, on Rua da Infância, in Funchal.
“I said I didn’t have any and continued on my way, and that’s when they decided to attack me,” the young victim continued. According to the same statement, the pickpockets reacted violently, attacking them with punches. During the ambush, one of them brandished a knife and stabbed him in the face, while the other threw the cell phone he had taken from the second victim into the water.
The episode was witnessed by a British citizen, author of the published video, who reports that he was swimming at the beach when he noticed the four individuals attacking the two young Nepalese men.
“Initially I thought you knew each other, but then I realized that they were actually attacking you and I got furious about it,” describes the whistleblower who offered to help them file a complaint with the PSP, offering himself as a witness.
“Why are these people being attacked? It’s sickening!” he said, condemning what happened and expressing his disbelief that such a thing had happened in a city known for being safe.
One of the victims reports that they are both from Nepal and are working in Madeira. He explains that they went to the beach to enjoy some leisure time before returning home to rest, as they had to go back to work the next day.
Click the Facebook to see video.