WATCH: Colorado Springs business needs help identifying shoplifting suspects
(COLORADO SPRINGS) — A local business is asking for your help to figure out who allegedly stole thousands of dollars worth of merchandise from them earlier this month. The suspects were caught on camera and now the owners of Blue Spruce Mercantile in Colorado Springs hope someone can recognize them.
According to Tareja Mitchem, Co-Owner of Blue Spruce Mercantile, she and her husband opened the shop in the fall of 2023, with the idea of being able to help their community by offering affordable prices on liquidation and overstock merchandise. But in early May, that all changed when according to Mitchem, shoplifters allegedly stole thousands of dollars worth of merchandise, twice, and it was all caught on camera.
Mitchem said the first incident happened on May 2, when a woman apparently walked out of the store with over $1,000 of merchandise. The second incident happened just a week later on May 9. “So it was, I would say, about 2:30 or 3 in the afternoon, and there were two men that had come into the store,” Mitchem said when recounting the second incident.
Mitchem said the suspects first looked around the store to see what they wanted, specifically in the electronics and speakers section, before coming back and allegedly stealing thousands of dollars worth of merchandise.
“They came back in when my husband was not here and we only had one employee working at the time… they just loaded up a cart and something over their shoulder and just walked right out the door, shoved it in their car, and took off,” said Mitchem.
The suspects then loaded the merchandise into the back of a green Ford Taurus. “It’s extremely detrimental to us,” Mitchem said, who has since filed a police report and made a call out to the community through Facebook.
FOX21 reached out to the Colorado Springs Police Department (CSPD) on Tuesday, May 21 for comment on the investigation, at which time there were no updates to the case. “It has been assigned to our retail theft investigations team and they are continuing to look into it,” wrote Caitlin Ford, Sr. Public Communications Specialist for CSPD. CSPD asks that if you have any information or know who these suspects may be, to please call the police.
Meantime, if you’d like to help out or check out the store, Blue Spruce Mercantile is located at 5677 North Academy Boulevard and more information can be found at the shop’s website, which is linked above. They also offer online shopping and soon, they plan to offer delivery, too.
“Life is busy and we get that. So we want to make it as convenient as possible for you to shop with us from anywhere at any time,” said Mitchem.
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