NYPD: Group Of Serial Burglars On The Loose For Months, Smashing Their Way Through NYC Businesses
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) – Police are looking for a group of serial burglars in the Bronx – who are smashing their way into businesses and getting away with it for months.
A mess has been left behind nearly every time the five burglars hit. At the grocery deli on University Avenue, the thieves left behind gaping holes, a destroyed ATM, and a loss of nearly $9,000.
"Everything destroyed in the front. The shelves torn down, holes everywhere," store worker Christian O. said.
Store employees believe the burglars used sledgehammers to break down a now boarded up wall. After ransacking the store, the suspects then damaged the ceiling, trying to access the business next door.
They eventually succeeded by breaking through the kitchen wall, stealing $10,000 from a cash box on the other side.
"It was a shock and it was very devastating."
Police say the middle of the night bandits have done this many times before. Surveillance photos captured them at the beginning of their streak in May, when police say they cut a hole through the roof of a check cashing store and used power tools to remove $66,000 from the safe.
Officers say they've hit at least 10 businesses. The most recent incident was at a beauty salon in September.
Burglars hammered their way through the roof. They then rummaged through drawers, steal $300 and then turned their attention again to other stores in the complex.
"They open one hole over there and they go instead to the next store and they break everything in the office," Paula Vargas of Aleisha Beauty Salon said.
Police say the five suspects are believed to have stolen tens of thousands of dollars during their crime spree. None of the them have been identified.