A vandal sent Fort Collins, Colorado police on a futile search last month. Early on a Sunday morning, a tagger sprayed graffiti on a string of businesses at a strip shopping mall. Because security cameras monitoring the exterior of one of the businesses captured the images of a young, white male at about 5:30 a.m., they believe they have a photo of the suspect. However, unfortunately,the widespread damage he wreaked that morning wasn’t even discovered until hours later.
Bright red spray paint graffiti expressing an unrecognizable meaning marred the exterior of the strip mall. One business, tagged on its front door and on an electric box outside of the store, didn’t discover the damage until an employee arrived for his shift at 9:30 a.m. Four hours passed between the incident and its discovery.
Damage in the wake of this graffiti vandalism covered the strip mall and spanned nearly two miles of the business district. Owners and employees of the vandalized businesses expressed shock and anger. Located in an active and safe area of town, they were not prepared for–or expecting–these extensive damages.
Another neighboring business’s van suffered a giant tag, which went undiscovered until midday. That business had to buy an entirely new wrap for its “show van,” an expense reportedly totaling a couple thousand dollars.
The suspect made a clean get away. Several hours passed before anyone discovered his destruction, which gave him plenty of time to elude police.
This mall is not a Stealth client. This story might have ended differently. Stealth Monitoring operators might have seen the culprits while the damage was being done and deterred the vandalism before it spread for miles. Operators can issue an audible warning and call the police. Thousand of dollars of damage might have been stopped in its tracks.
Please contact Stealth today for more information to protect your shopping center, office building, or other property. Visit our web site to see actual videos of criminals being apprehended.
