Employees punched, kicked and weaponized a chair to struggle off thieves armed with hammers throughout an tried smash-and-grab heist on Sunday at a jewelry store within the Bella Terra buying middle in Huntington Beach.
The thieves bolted into Princess Bride Diamonds at 7821 Edinger Ave round midday, police mentioned. Four individuals wearing darkish clothes instantly used a hammer to smash a show case, as seen in surveillance footage the store shared in an Instagram story.
The intruders had pulled into the outside mall’s parking zone in a Honda, mentioned an worker at a close-by store who declined to provide his identify for security causes. He mentioned he noticed three or 4 individuals sporting ski masks and carrying hammers get out of the automobile. One of them was carrying a backpack with a camouflage print.
“As soon as I saw them get out of the car, I knew they were going to rob Princess Bride,” he mentioned.
They got here and went, he mentioned, in beneath a minute.
As the masked thieves ransacked the store, two employees rushed at them and exchanged blows, knocking one intruder to the bottom, the video exhibits. Another workers member carrying a chair ran towards the melee and struck one of many thieves with it as they tried to flee.
“We fought back and are ok,” somebody from the store wrote within the intro to the Instagram video.”Fortunately they weren’t in a position to get something due to our superior crew.”
Justin Lowrie mentioned he was in a backyard close to the jewelry store when he and a number of other others heard the sound of glass being smashed.
“Some of us ran, thinking the glass breaking was gunshots,” he mentioned.
Brian Lam was working at SomiSomi, an ice cream store subsequent to the jewelry store, when he heard three loud noises, after which noticed one individual sporting one thing overlaying his face operating south towards the parking zone. Lam later peeked inside Princess Bride and noticed at the very least two show glass show instances had been shattered.
Nobody was damage, in keeping with a girl who answered the telephone on the jewelry store on Sunday afternoon.
An outline of what, if something, was taken was not instantly accessible.
Another smash-and-grab occurred about an hour later in Santa Ana, at Don Roberto’s Jewelry Store on the 1600 block of West seventeenth Street, Santa Ana Police Sgt. Maria Lopez mentioned. Four thieves managed to take $7,000 value of merchandise from the enterprise.
Later, police noticed a automobile suspected to have been concerned within the Santa Ana theft, Lopez mentioned. Three individuals inside had been taken into custody in reference to the heist, and investigators had been looking for a fourth.
No merchandise was instantly recovered from the suspects or the automobile they had been in, Lopez mentioned. It was not clear if the incidents in Huntington Beach and Santa Ana had been associated.
Last month, at the very least two different Orange County jewelry shops had been hit with smash-and-grabs. Thieves used hammers to interrupt open glass show instances at Kay Jewelers within the Westminster Mall on April 4, and one other department of that store on the Brea Mall on April 15. About $200,000 value of merchandise was taken in every of these heists.
As of mid-April, there have been at the very least 35 smash-and-grab jewelry store robberies in California since May of 2021 — a quantity disproportionate to different states, mentioned John Kennedy, president of the Jewelers’ Security Alliance, an trade nonprofit group.
It’s not that California is a bigger state, he mentioned. He attributed the robberies to gangs.
“That’s way off the charts of being unusual,” he mentioned. “It scares people in the industry.”
This is a growing story. More information shall be added when it turns into accessible.