Malolos City—Close to half a million pesos in cash were carted away by a group of burglars who robbed three adjoining establishments along McArthur Highway at the Calumpit-Malolos boundary over the weekend.
It was a virtual “take-all-you-can” spree for the robbers as they emptied the cash vault of the SamgyupSalamat Korean BBQ “eat-all-you-can” restaurant which opened only last Feb. 1 this year.
The robbers entered through the store’s backdoor by climbing up a roof-ladder used for maintenance purposes of the commercial building that houses five adjoining establishments.
Footages of the break-in from a CCTV camera of one of the restaurants showed the three robbers wearing face masks and hoods. The robbers casually left after emptying the office of all its valuables. They also destroyed and took the hard-disc drive of the CCTV recorder.
Footages from the CCTV camera of Shakey’s Calumpit also showed the three burglars passing through the ceiling of the pizza store towards the kitchen. However, the robbers were not able to access its office and vault because of the presence of a security guard at the store’s main door.
The suspects also climbed up the ceiling to access the office of AXA-Bulacan which they also vandalized. Avigail Fernando, branch manager of the insurance firm, said only P10,000 cash were taken from their office vault.
The robbers, however, destroyed the CCTV recorder and took its memory disc and UPS battery. The robbers even ate pizza while taking away several valuables. They left behind a Canon projector which had already been detached from its conference hall as they left hurriedly.
Eric Illescas, franchise owner of Shakey’s Calumpit, said incidents of robberies and burglaries should be looked into and followed up by police operatives so that businessmen would not be discouraged.
Janine Reyes, branch cashier of AXA, said their computer network was cut off at around 11:40 p.m. Friday night.