Henderson police investigate after 2 puppies were stolen from Petland on Christmas — VIDEO
Two intruders broke into a Henderson Petland shop early Christmas morning, making off with two purebred puppies worth more than $6,000, the shop’s manager said.
The Henderson Police Department responded about 3:12 a.m. Sunday to the store at 510 Marks St. Suite 120, police spokeswoman Michelle French said. She said Tuesday that the incident is under investigation and that she didn’t know whether arrests have been made in the case.
Petland manager Najla Silmi said surveillance video from the store Christmas morning shows two people in all black clothing, ski masks and gloves breaking in through glass near the store entrance and crawling inside.
Video shows the intruders checking to see that they were alone and checking for money in the cash registers, finding none, Silmi said.
Footage shows one intruder running outside of the store and standing watch while the other stayed inside, kicking in a glass kennel and taking a husky puppy, she said.
Silmi said the video showed the intruder exiting the shop, handing the husky to the accomplice and re-entering. The video then shows the intruder shattering glass in a top kennel and taking a Boston terrier puppy, she said.
The invasion lasted one minute, she said.
The husky, a 3-month-old male, is valued around $3,600, she said; the Boston terrier, a 2-month-old male, is valued around $3,200.
Silmi said she believes the Christmas break-in is related to an incident a few weeks ago.
On that instance, Silmi said she stopped by the store about midnight to grab paperwork and saw a gold four-door sedan parked nearby, which she found unusual.
She said she left the store and was stopped by Henderson police. Officers ran her car’s license plate, questioned her and discovered she owned the store, she said. They left, then she did.
Silmi said that as she drove off, she noticed the car that had been parked outside her shop was at a nearby Del Taco, 550 Marks St. When she described this to her store staff, one employee suggested that the person parked outside the pet store could have called police, aiming to track response times.
Silmi said she concluded it would “make sense that people could steal dogs in one minute, knowing police would show up in five.”
The Petland reopened Monday, but damages from the break-in remain. The storefront’s shattered glass has been boarded up, and the damaged kennels need replacing, she said.
Contact Jessica Terrones at jterrones@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0381. Follow @JessATerrones on Twitter
