Grass Valley Jewelry Thieves Get Head-Start After Phone Line Disconnected
GRASS VALLEY (CBS13) — Two burglars got a seven-hour head-start with cases of jewelry worth thousands of dollars before police were called.
As soon as they broke into Grass Valley Gold and Silver, the alarm went off. But because the owners had disconnected their land line, the police were never called.
It took just 30 seconds for two thieves to break in, steal $7,000 worth of jewelry, and rob the Arnoldis of their sense of security.
"We feel like, have we been watched?" said Shara Arnoldi. "It's scary."
It was on Sunday just a few hours after she and her husband Greg closed their downtown ship when their surveillance cameras recorded two men casing the store. Those men would smash the door with a rock and go straight for the jewelry.
"They bust this case, and grabbed everything and it looked like they had a pillowcase or a bad," Shara said.
The couple's alarm went off, but the couple had disconnected one of three landlines because they didn't need it. That was the one connected to the alarm company that would have alerted police.
"This crime actually happened at 8:30 p.m., and it didn't get reported to us until 3:30 a.m.," she said.
Seven hours passed until someone delivering the morning paper spotted the shattered glass and called 911.
The couple is now relying on the surveillance video of the two men they say got away—for now.
"There is some mentality of, 'I will not get caught,' but you will," Shara said.
Other surveillance video around downtown Grass Valley may also have caught a glimpse of the suspects.
