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Woman indecently assaulted in Tai Tam park robbery

Couple endure night in bush after three suspects take $8,500

A hiker and his girlfriend were pushed down a hill in Tai Tam Country Park, robbed by three men and left tied to a tree for about seven hours on Sunday.

Police last night were still hunting for the three suspects, who got away with about $500 in cash, two bank cards and a mobile phone. They also withdrew about $8,000 from the victims' bank accounts at an automatic teller machine in Central, after forcing them to reveal their personal identification numbers, police said.

One robber indecently assaulted the female victim, 28, when she was tied to the tree.

Police suspect two of the men were mainlanders since they spoke Putonghua, and one was local as he spoke fluent Cantonese.

The holdup was the third country park robbery this year where victims were tied to trees and ordered to reveal their PINs. The other two cases in the same park in February and May remained unsolved, police said.

The ordeal of the two victims, aged 28 and 30, started on Sunday afternoon when they began a hike along Tai Tam Reservoir Road near Hong Kong Parkview at 2pm. About 30 minutes later, the three men stopped them.

'The victims were pushed down a hillside. They fell about 10 to 15 metres ... and then they were tied to a tree,' the police source said.

'The pair was robbed of about $500, credit cards and a mobile phone. They were then ordered at knifepoint to reveal the PIN numbers for their credit cards.'

One robber left with the cards while the other two men carrying knives guarded the victims. They also left at about 9pm.

The victims freed themselves about half an hour later. By that time it was dark and they were unable to find their way down the hill, so they slept on the hill overnight. Shortly after dawn they walked down the hill, borrowed a mobile phone from a couple they met, and called police at 6.30am.

The woman, suffering abrasions to her arms, knees and back, was sent to Eastern Hospital for treatment.

Officers mounted a huge search and used tracking dogs, but no trace of the robbers was found.

Only six of the 18 robberies in various country parks in the first 10 months of the year have been solved.

Sunday's robbery came as Secretary for Security Ambrose Lee Siu-kwong reported an 8.3 per cent decrease in the overall crime rate in the first 10 months of this year, compared to the same period last year.

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