Cargo theft at Schiphol: €3 million in iPhones stolen

A shipment containing 3 million euros in iPhones was stolen at Schiphol airport on Saturday, March 14, the Koninklijke Marechaussee announced n Wednesday.  A 35-year old Polish driver was arrested a day later. 

The phones were stolen from a company on Schiphol-Rijk. The arrested driver is suspected of taking the shipment from the company. He has been released from custody, but remains a suspect. 

The Koninklijke Marechaussee suspects that multiple companies were involved with this theft, using forged documents to smuggle the shipment of phones off site. Investigation showed that the stolen cargo may have landed in Noord-Holland. Some of the stolen iPhones were also said to have been activated in the Netherlands.

It is yet to be confirmed whether any of the stolen phones were retrieved.

“If there is the involvement of employees of a company at Schiphol, our investigation will be given high priority," says Major Robert van Kapel of the Koninklijke Marechaussee, a policing force that works as part of the Dutch military, said to newspaper AD.

This is not the first time cargo is stolen from Schiphol. On May 16, as many as 4400 Apple Watches worth 530,000 euros were stolen from a warehouse of a transport company at the east of Schiphol, AD reported. Just like the recent case, insiders from the transport company were arrested as suspects.