A female reporter from Argentina was robbed on the air as she reported live among a crowd of fans celebrating the World Cup in Qatar.
Dominique Metzger, or the Todo Noticias network, was broadcasting from Doha just before the World Cup kicked off, and as she recorded her report, the fans around her began rifling through her purse, stealing documents and money right there, live on camera.
Metzger also told her audience that she did report the theft to local police, who she said asked her what sort of punishment she would like to see doled out to the thieves.
Authorities told her that they would look at her video, identify the criminals, and then tell her she could decide what their punishment would be.
“I had my small bag on me with all the things that one needs, my wallet, the keys to our hotel room,” she told her network anchor in an interview.
“…I was dancing with the crowd,” she added, “and I’m convinced that it was at that moment when someone opened the bag zipper and took my wallet.”
“I didn’t realize at that moment, you know you’re live on air, with music and crowds around you, and I was focused on you talking to me too. So I wasn’t paying attention, she continued. “After I finish my live report, I wanted to take my wallet to buy a water bottle, and then I realized I didn’t have it.”
Metzger also noted that when she went to the police station, they ignored her and would not take her report because she is a woman. However, officials finally heard her after she was escorted to a police station manned solely by women.
“Male police won’t register you,” Metzger explained. “As soon as I got to the police station, they took me to another place where there were only women. I asked why I was there, and they told me as I’m a woman, it has to be a policewoman who has to help me.”
Qatari officials have created a vast surveillance network outside and inside the venue where the games are being held, and Metzger was assured that the thieves would be identified by the video.
Then she was further shocked when the female police officers told her that if she desired, the crook could be sentenced to five years in prison for stealing her wallet.
“I told them I just want my wallet back, I won’t be making the decision for the justice system,” Metzger said she told the police officers.
Metzger is not the first foreign reporter to find trouble while working the World Cup this year.
Last week, authorities in Qatar shut down a live broadcast by Danish television reporter Rasmus Tantholdt. They appeared to physically threaten him and his film crew, going so far as to threaten to smash their camera.
The assault, caught on video, does not appear prompted by anything Tantholdt or his team were doing. A group of apparent government authorities drove up to Tantholdt mid-broadcast in a golf cart, got out, and began hassling his cameraman. The footage aired on Denmark’s TV2 appears to show a struggle over the camera. At the same time, an outraged Tantholdt tries to explain that the network received formal accreditation to broadcast in the country.
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