$66K really worth of designer luggage stolen from Tampa boutique, lookup warrant states

TAMPA — Two gentlemen stole 45 designer purses valued at $66,840 from a Tampa boutique in March, in accordance to a search warrant submitted in Hillsborough County District Courtroom.

The theft took location about 2 a.m. on March 7 when the gentlemen utilised a crowbar to shatter a glass window and enter Couture Designer Resale Boutique at 10117 Montague St. in Westchase, the warrant claims.

Security footage captured the men grabbing the luggage and fleeing in a black 2017 Ford Explorer. Hillsborough deputies say they chased the vehicle right up until its occupants abandoned it at 6920 N Dale Mabry Freeway — with the handbags however inside of.

The warrant suggests the Explorer was a rental auto loaned to someone via the peer-to-peer vehicle-sharing company Turo.

No arrest had been produced in the case as of this week, explained Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Marco Villareal. The male who rented the motor vehicle from Turo, however, was the emphasis of the research warrant submitted. Deputies sought entry to his texts, contact logs and other digital substance on the man’s cellphone before, throughout and just after the theft.

Subscriber information and facts from Verizon said the man is from Atlanta and that he produced many phone calls the early morning of March 7.

Deputies say the renter instructed the Explorer’s owner, Larry Clayton, two times following the theft that he could not return the motor vehicle since it experienced been stolen.

Clayton advised deputies he made use of a service identified as Bouncie that tracks wherever and how renters generate his SUV. Information from the support showed the SUV was close to Couture Designer Resale Boutique at the time of the theft and later was driven as fast as 101 mph even though fleeing from deputies. The service also detected “hard braking” all over the time the car or truck was deserted, the warrant states.

Deputies recovered Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Chanel and MCM purses from the SUV, as perfectly as a yellow crowbar, neon gloves, slippers and a handgun, in accordance to the warrant. A lot of of the luggage nevertheless experienced tags on them from the boutique.

The theft will come amid a national wave of “smash-and-grab” crimes that involved the theft of $1 million in Hermes luggage in December from a South Florida boutique retail outlet.

Deputies wrote in the warrant that they system to demand the suspects with burglary of an unoccupied composition with property destruction in excess of $1,000 and grand theft third diploma.