I was going home one evening and I was in the Buendia cor Taft-Divisoria jeep when I witnessed this crime a few seats away.
I got in the jeep around 8PM near the Buendia-Taft intersection, there were only roughly 4-5 people then. Everyone inside looked safe (I always take a look at the people inside and if I can get a good position before I get in - I've experienced bad stuff there more than 2 times already. This was still early so, although it's not the best setup, I figured it's ok) so I hopped in and stayed at the end near the exit. A minute or so after, a 40-ish guy got in and stayed in the middle on my side of the jeep, and shortly afterwards 3 or 4 more people. The jeep was still in Buendia at this point.
This 3-4 people consisted of a mother carrying a small child, and 2-3 decent looking men. They don't seem to know each other. All except one sat on one side of the jeepney. The mom and child sat on one side of the 40-ish guy, 1-2 men sat on the other side. The last of this group sat on the other side of the jeepney sat right in front of the guy.
A few minutes after the jeep turned to Taft, the child spilled what seemed to be some ketchup on the guy (Or it could be someone on the outside, I'm not really sure. My mind was a bit preoccupied at that point). Then this group sprung into action, helping the guy wipe the ketchup from his shirt. I'm not sure if other passengers offered to help - I guess not. They even had tissue paper ready. In all honesty, there was very little ketchup on the man. But their actions seemed like there was a lot.
At this point, we thought the man and the man in front of him knew each other. The man in front seemed to be the most enthusiastic in helping. They tried to wipe ketchup from him for a full minute or so, maybe a bit more.
The guy was finally "clean." A few seconds after, the people seated beside him all got off the jeep at the same time. A few minutes later, the man sitting on the other side got off as well.
When we got to the DLSU area, the man checked his pocket and realized that his mobile phone and wallet were gone.
A crime perfectly executed. This happened because of the distraction offered to the passengers, and no one knew of this beforehand.
On the other side, I'm happy this whole fiasco happened without guns.
