Police are following strong lines of inquiry into who was responsible for the theft of tens of thousands of dollars worth of property from a tourist bus in Hamilton today.
Hamilton Tactical Coordinator, Detective Sergeant Mark Greene, said Police received a call about 10.30am that a bus chartered to carry a group of Chinese tourists had been broken into at the Hamilton Gardens.
"The bus had been parked up in the Gardens' car park about 9.30am to allow the group to tour the grounds and on their return they found the bus had been broken into.
"Tens of thousands of dollars worth of luggage, property and various denominations of foreign currency were taken by the thieves but fortunately information is at hand that we hope will enable us to affect a prompt arrest," he said.
Meanwhile Police are asking businesses and banks to advise them of anyone suspicious trying to change large denominations of foreign currency.
"There were sums of Australian and US dollars taken which are relatively common but there were also significant amounts of the Chinese currency, the Renminbi, stolen which should be quite distinctive.
"The Renminbi comes in denominations of 1, 5,10, 20, 50 and 100 and is distinctive in that it has a picture of Mao Zedong on the obverse side of each bank note."
Mr Greene said it was important attacks such as this on overseas tourists were quickly resolved.
"Often the negative publicity in the victims' home country can far out weigh the seriousness of the actual crime and have ramifications for the whole of the country in terms of people's confidence in New Zealand as a safe place to visit.
"That is why it is important we are able to catch those responsible as quickly as possible."
Anyone with any information on who may be responsible for the theft of the tourists property is asked to contact the Hamilton Central Police Station on 07 858 6200.
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