Luohu police announced Monday that they detained a suspected thief, accused of stealing luxury watches valued at more than 400,000 yuan (US$80,000), within 10 hours of receiving a report of the theft.

A cleaner at a Luohu shopping center found the door of a shop selling luxury watches broken at about 8 a.m. Saturday morning. The center's management checked the site and found 10 watches missing, each costing between 10,000 yuan and 80,000 yuan, local Chinese-language newspapers reported.

The center soon reported it to the police. The police checked the surveillance cameras at the shopping center and listed a crippled man as a major suspect.

The Luohu public security bureau asked policemen in the Nanhu station to check for clues in more than 160 locations like bus stops, rented houses and watch shops.

At about 6 p.m. the same day, policeman Lin Zhuqiang found a man, crippled in the right leg and handicapped in the right arm, walking on Jianshe Road. Lin stopped the man and found nine luxury watches in the man's bag.

The man, surnamed Zhang, confessed during police interrogation that he broke into the watch shop at midnight while the shopping center's security guards were repairing another shop door. He said he had stolen 10 watches and the police later found another watch in the hostel where the man lived.

The bureau attributed its quick and efficient action to its recent reform instituted April 1, under which more policemen are sent to patrol roads.

"Previously, we need to mobilize policemen on different posts to take actions in similar cases, but now, we only need to send a message to those policemen on patrol," Wang Hao, the head of the Nanhu station, told the Shenzhen Special Zone Daily. The station now has about 45 police personnel on road patrol everyday, accounting for almost half of its total personnel.

Lin Zhuqiang said he previously spent most of his time in the office. After the reform, he spent most of the time patrolling roads and the experience had sharpened his eyes in identifying suspects.

Editor: Yan