Lexington, SC 11/20/2021 (Paul Kirby) – Sometime between closing time Thursday night and opening on Friday morning, several people broke into the Tropical Grille and Marco’s Pizza which are located side-by-side in a strip center in the 5400 block of Sunset Boulevard in Lexington. The perpetrators “commando crawled” across the floor of the businesses, broke into their safes, and made off with what little there was there to steal. The two suspects then made their escape out a door undetected.
According to the owner of the Tropical Grille, several other Marco’s Pizzas in other Lexington County jurisdictions were hit in the exact same way on the same night according to the information he's recieved. He said the suspects didn’t bother anything else in the restaurants and seemed to have gone straight to the safes as if they knew right where they were. "I suspect they've either been in Marco's many times or simply have worked in the retsaraunt industry and are familiar with the layout of our kinds of businessses. Most businesses like ours have safes in about the same spots."
“I never leave anything of value in my safe overnight,” he continued. “Because of that habit, I didn’t really lose anything of value. I have insurance that will cover the damages they did to the store and the safe. It’s just a shame that small businesses like ours that have already been hurt by the pandemic and have experienced lots of other problems over the past year have to deal with people that think they can take what they want from others. It’s wrong and it could really put a young business in jeopardy if they got hit for much now days,” he concluded.
The Lexington Police Department responded to the burglaries and have assigned an investigator to work these cases. There is good quality surveillance video of the thieves in action but because of the way that they crawled, you can’t really see their faces. They each had on a hoodie and wore gloves as they committed this crime. They also both appear to be young men although that’s not for certain. According to the business owner, as of Friday afternoon, no one had been taken into custody to his knowledge.
The owner of Tropical Grille has asked that the public look at the pictures and ideos to see if they can help the police to crack this safe cracking case. “Since they appear to be young, I’m hoping that they’ll run their mouths maybe bragging to someone about what they did. I know it’s a longshot,” he said, “but someone might actually even recognize them by the clothes they were wearing.”
Please look at the attached photo closely. The entire videos from the Tropical Grille are also attached. If you recognize either of the suspects or have any information about this crime, please call the Lexington Police Department at (803) 359-6260 and ask to speak to an investigator. The information you have might help to right this wrong.
Inside Store Video #1
Inside Store Video #2
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