Thieves hit businesses at Mapua Wharf

A string of thefts in the Mapua Wharf area has left three businesses and the owner of a vehicle out of pocket.

Golden Bear, Alberta’s, the Mapua Country Store and a parked car were broken into overnight on Thursday.

It’s not the first time Golden Bear owner Jim Matranga’s brewery has been been broken into. Last week’s hit has added to two previous occasions he has been burgled in the last four months.

Last week a few wine bottles were taken and one of the doors was damaged, he said.

The first time thieves smashed in the front doors and grabbed the till. The thieves came back a second time, again bashing in the front glass doors leaving thousands of dollars worth of damage. They left empty handed.

‘‘Previous to that I don’t think we had ever been broken into in eight years.

‘‘It’s not pleasant to get broken into ... We called the police straight away but .... I don’t know what they can really do.’’

Mapua Country Store had its window jemmied open before thieves stole cash and a St John’s donation box.

Store owner Kirsten Ammann said they had video surveillance in-store but the act hit hard.

‘‘The thing that really got me was the St John’s donation box ... that one was the fullest and had quite a bit of money in it, unfortunately. A couple of hun- dred dollars maybe?’’

Ammann said being a new business every bit of cash helped and this had set the store behind.

‘‘It’s just hard when you’re trying to make a living and you’ve got those sort of scumbags doing what they do,’’ she said.

‘‘It was really unnerving coming in and finding it in the morning and the staff were pretty unsettled that day. The locals just can’t believe that it’s happened again.’’

She said the community and other businesses had extremely supportive.

Alberta’s was the third store to be broken into.

Mapua Country Store owners handed over video surveillance to police and distributed images on social media. Police have taken fingerprints and are continuing investigations.

Anyone with information related to the incident is asked to contact police on (03) 546 3840 or anonymously via Crime Stoppers on 0800 555 111. been