A Saudi news crew reporting on London’s growing street crime became victims themselves when a thief snatched their equipment in broad daylight—right in front of their rolling cameras.
The Al Ekhbariya team, from the state-owned Saudi broadcaster, was filming on Oxford Street, one of the city’s busiest shopping destinations, when a man in a grey jacket suddenly approached, grabbed a piece of their gear, and ran off. The entire incident, lasting only seconds, was captured in sharp detail on video.
The channel later shared the clip on X with a pointed remark: “While filming a report on the rise of theft in London, Al Ekhbariya crew had one of their devices stolen on Oxford Street.”
The theft comes amid a sharp rise in street crime across the capital. Official figures show that a mobile phone is stolen roughly every three minutes in the UK, with the British Home Office recently describing the problem as reaching “epic proportions.” The year ending December 2024 saw an estimated 2.9 million theft incidents nationwide, with theft from the person in London alone rising by more than 40% compared to the previous year.
Authorities have rolled out targeted operations such as Operation Swipe, which cut phone snatching in the City of London by nearly 30% through visible patrols, CCTV monitoring, and phone-marking schemes. In February 2025, the Metropolitan Police seized 1,000 stolen phones and arrested 230 suspects in a single week-long crackdown. Public awareness efforts—like the giant purple “Mind the Grab” pavement markings on Oxford Street—aim to remind pedestrians to keep devices out of sight.
Social media users quickly amplified the irony of the Al Ekhbariya footage, with one commenter calling it “the report that wrote itself.” London police have yet to confirm if an investigation into the theft is underway.
