Muggers leave their own pictures behind

BERLIN (Reuters) - Two German teenagers robbed a girl but accidentally left their own pictures behind for police on a discarded mobile phone.

After stealing a 15-year-old's shoes, money and mobile phone, the two older girls gave her an old mobile phone, police in the western city of Bochum said on Wednesday.

But the two 17-year-olds had forgotten the phone had their own photos, striking smiley poses, which police published online on Tuesday in an effort to find the culprits.

The two muggers turned themselves in almost simultaneously when the pictures appeared on the evening news.

"One girl was brought down by her father after he saw her on the television," said police spokesman Frank Plewka. "Today the pictures were in the papers, so the father's phone has been ringing all day, because everyone recognized them."

Neither of the two had been in trouble with the law before.