The Ridge at Fox Run

Jackson Creek Crossing Robbery

Robbery at Strip Mall

This article is from the September 9, 1999 issue of The Tribune.

Jackson Creek Crossing doing a strip search for robbers

By Steve Prudhomme

For five years, Joseph Dang worked at a Chinese restaurant in an area of Colorado Springs that. he said was among the worst in the city. During that time, he said there were no robberies at the restaurant.
At the beginning of August, the Jackson Creek Chinese Restaurant that Dang manages first opened its doors. Less than a month later, his restaurant, along with four other stores at Jackson Creek Crossing, were robbed of an estimated $2,500 in cash, according to Monument police.
"This is supposed to, be a nice area," Dang said.
Police said the robbers appear to have first broken into the back door of the Chinese restaurant in the early morning hours of Aug. 25 and crawled through the ceiling to the liquor store next door.
"They crawled through like a couple of mice," said Dang, noting that the robbers caused several thousand dollars worth of damage in the restaurant but apparently didn't take anything. "We don't leave anything (money) here," Dang said.
The next stop for the robbers was Eagle Wine & Spirits, where they broke through the ceiling, left debris and white footprints on the carpet before going back up into the ceiling and returning to the restaurant.
Manager Rob Wilkinson, who was the first to survey the damage later that morning, speculated that the robbers were scared off by the store camera and motion detector. With nothing apparently taken, Wilkinson said he feels very fortunate.
After breaking into Something to Wear clothing store, where they took around $300 and damaged the rear door when they pried it open, according to owner Paul Wegeman, the perpetrators went through the bathroom wall and into Pakmail. Owner Bart Labram said they tore things up and took some money. Checks, he added, were left behind.
The robbers, police told Labram, broke through, another wall at Pakmail and into Cost Cutters Family Hair Care. They found a safe, which was bolted to the floor, in the front and dragged it to the rear of the store, back through the hole and into Pakmail.
They didn't exit from the rear door of Cost Cutters, explained regional manager Sally Zito, because the door has a deadbolt lock that can only be opened with a key from both sides.
Zito said they didn't take anything else, such as an expensive pair of sunglasses or a computer, and left nothing in disarray. "They were just after cash."
Back in Pakmail with the safe, the robbers apparently sat at a rear table and sorted through the money and checks. Labram said they left the checks, still paperclipped together, and receipts on the table. They went out the back door with the safe.
Police think the robbers may have also broken into the dry-cleaning place, located next to Something to Wear, and taken some money out of the cash register. What's puzzling, according to Labram, is that there are no visible signs of break-in.
Were these robbers seasoned professionals or, based on the sloppiness of certain aspects of the robberies, the work of kids?
Wegeman said they knew enough to break into a strip mail. Conversely, they left fingerprints, footprints and a can of chewing tobacco.. "That was dumb," Wegeman said.
Wegeman said he's disturbed that Monument police. with 10 officers on staff, had only one officer on duty the night of the robberies. That officer, he added, was working a drug bust that night. The merchants are planning on going to town hall and ask for more police protection area. Said Labram: "We contribute $300,000 in sales tax each year. We need to talk about police coverage."
In the meantime, the developer of the shopping center has put up a $500 reward leading to the arrest or capture of the robbers. Anyone with any information is asked to call Monument police at 481-3253.
Sgt. Rick Tudor of Monument police said there are no leads or suspects in the case. Although fingerprints were left behind, that doesn't ensure a quick or easy capture. "You have to eliminate everyone who was in the store," Tudor explained. "Anyone who's ever been at that strip mall could be a suspect.
Tudor doesn't believe there's any connection between these robberies and the recent one at Brookhart's. "That was more of a pro," Tudor stated. "'They knew what was going on."
The robberies were typical of any strip mail where all the doors don't have deadbolt locks, according to Tudor, who maintains that the robberies never would have occurred if all the businesses had deadbolts. He added that it takes only one business without a deadbolt to open the door, so to speak, for a robbery.
Doors without deadbolts, as most of the businesses had, don't provide much of a deterrent. "Give me 30 seconds and a tire iron and I'll be in there," Tudor said. "You can flex the steel. You're not going to break a deadbolt."
Addressing the store owners' complaints about the lack of police patrol, Tudor said there's usually at least one officer on the road doing routine patrols in Monument to include the Jackson Creek area. In October, he added, the department plans on assigning a full-time officer to Jackson Creek.