Elderly visitors to Ninewells Hospital have been targeted by unscrupulous thieves in the car park.
Police are dealing with a number of distraction-type thefts in the hospital’s grounds, as well as several supermarkets in Dundee and Angus.
Officers said that elderly members of the public have been approached and asked for change of a £1 coin or a similar favour along these lines.
While they looked for change in their purse or wallet, the thieves stole bank cards, money, handbags, or anything they could grab while their target was distracted.
A Police Scotland spokesman said: “We have had incidents like this reported to us at car parks at Ninewells Hospital and two supermarkets in Dundee on Thursday and Friday, and at a supermarket in Montrose on Friday.
“On each occasion, the person who distracts the victim is described as an eastern European female, although we cannot confirm if it is the same person on each occasion.
“Our advice is not to engage with anyone you are unsure of if you are approached in a car park.
“If you are asked for change, it is not rude or impolite to decline, and do not feel pressured into doing so.
“There is a possibility that there have been more incidents of this nature that we have not been informed of, and we would ask anyone who has been a victim of this type of crime in the past two weeks or so to please get in touch with us by calling 101.”
The incidents in Dundee happened at the Tesco store on the Kingsway and Aldi on Arbroath Road on March 8.
In Montrose, it was also people in an Aldi car park targeted, on March 9.
