Best Buy Burglary Suspects Nabbed In Hialeah
HIALEAH (CBSMiami) – Two people believed to have burglarized a Best Buy store in Hialeah were taken into custody early Tuesday morning.
Around 6 a.m., the two individuals police identified as Journel Lewis, 17, and Bobby Pierre Louis, 17, broke into the store on W 20th Avenue through a door on the loading dock.
Four employees were inside the store and called the police when they realized something was wrong.
"They heard a bang," said Hialeah police spokesman Eddie Rodriguez, "They start looking through the video surveillance and they saw the males inside the warehouse stealing. They called 911."
Some of the officers sent to store spotted the suspect's car. Others set up a perimeter in the area of 5th Street and East 8th Avenue to box them in. Hialeah Elementary, at 550 East 8th Avenue, was placed on a partial lockdown as a precaution.
Rodriguez said the chase came to an end at East 5th Avenue and 9th Street, right across from Reben Masson's restaurant.
"I saw a car running really fast with the police behind," said Masson, "After that we heard a boom."
Both men tried to escape on foot, but didn't get very far.
"We caught one guy right off the bat," said Rodriguez, "The second subject who was deep inside the perimeter was later apprehended by a K9."
In fact, the second suspect was captured in front of Hialeah Elementary. After he was taken into custody, the school lockdown was then lifted.
"I went to the car, we saw like 30 laptops" said Masson, "That's the first time we saw something like that around here."
In addition to the stolen merchandise, police said the car they were driving, a Nissan Maxima, had also been reported as stolen.
Police believe the two people arrested may be responsible for several area Best Buy store burglaries in the last year.
"We got broken into last week, it was five," one employee told 911 operators. "And there've been two other break-ins this week at other Best Busy and they had seven people. It was the exact same crew."
