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Brian Dunn has owned the Barefoot Mini Mart, a beach-themed general store and café on Skaha Lake Road between the airport and the Skaha Hills housing development for about a year. In that time, he and his shop have been blissfully crime-free.
Until Friday night.
"Somebody broke in around 11:00 (pm) Friday," said Dunn Saturday morning, adding that the entire incident was captured on a security camera.
"He was wearing a mask and a hoodie. He stole all the cigarettes, all the cash -- about $500 -- a power drill, a set of expensive binoculars, a couple of walkie talkies, and two flashlights. That's what he used to move around in here.
"He used a big rock to smash one of the garage door windows. He smashed through that, climbed in, had a pop and took his time. It took him about 15 minutes."
Dunn's cameras dutifully sent off an alert to his phone as the incident was unfolding. But, according to Dunn, the phone was "dead."
"We didn't know it had happened 'til Saturday morning," he said. "The fellow who works with me here called me and we came down, and I called the police and they came down too.
"They're, like, okay, come to the station and give us a copy of the video and a list of what you're missing. And that was it."
Dunn suspects the perpetrator is part of a homeless village he says has recently appeared in the area.
"There were no problems until a group of homeless people moved in just on the other side of the airport," he said. "On the other side of the airport, there's probably ten bikes, five or six shopping carts and people living there."
Dunn toured PentictonNow around the store -- to the cigarette locker where seven cartons of smokes and two cartons of cigars were stolen, and to the safe, where the thief, said Dunn, "smashed the lock" to gain access.
"We had a tip jar in there," he said. "We've been saving up the tips for one of the girls who works here with us. She's a single mom. We were going to do a little party for her at the end of the year.
"So going forward we're going to stop leaving money in the safe overnight."
Dunn describes the person in the security video as a "small guy, fairly skinny, with beige pants and a blue hoodie with a Vancouver Canucks logo," and hopes anyone with knowledge of the incident might contact Penticton RCMP.
And one other thing. Dunn is already upgrading Barefoot Mini Mart's security measures. On the way is improved lighting, a siren, and a new gate/fence system to help safeguard the front entrances.
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