A hot cup of coffee might have been perfect in the wee hours of the morning Saturday, but the new 3 Bean Cafe on Key Highway was still hours away from its grand opening when a burglar pulled off a smash and grab before they could welcome their first customer.
"We came in and we saw there was glass everywhere and the whole door was smashed... the whole thing and our register was broken,” Mackenzie Zeckowski said. “We don't keep money in it at night so they didn't get anything out of it, but that was our first day opening."
T.J. Smith of the Baltimore City Police Department says that was one of seven similar crimes targeting businesses in and around the downtown area within a 24-hour period.
"Cash, some products, something as minimal as chocolate bars were stolen out of these,” Smith said. “So it's something that we're keeping an eye on, but we did arrest one person, Donnell Barksdale, for the St. Paul Cafe burglary. We're looking at him to see if he might be responsible for these other burglaries."
A similar crime unfolded on North Charles Street at Home Slice Pizza that same night.
"He just came inside and then ran to the cash register and then got the money and was out... maybe 45 seconds or 60 seconds and everything had been done," said the owner, Logan Salis.
But in this case, it appears the burglar was a white male, which means that several different people may be responsible for the crimes that are taking their toll on the businesses' bottom line.
"Baltimore has been struggling with all the riots and everything,” Salis said. “Now, we're having a tough time. You look at the door and the cash money they stole---you're looking at almost $2,500 in damage."
