*UPDATE*
Midwest Photo Exchanged has released a few more bits of information about their burglary.
The perpetrators entered the building by cutting a hole in the roof and slid down a pole to gain entrance to the stock room, where they were able to carry off hundreds of lenses and cameras.
Below are two images of one of the assailants as well as suspects casing the store prior to the incident.
From MPEX:
Regarding the burglary at Midwest photo, we just found footage of 4 suspects casing the building starting on 3/14 around 1 pm. They are in what looks like a Jeep Cherokee from the robbery and we see them surveil the entry point and we see them walk around the building and check doors around the building. They come in in 2 pairs at separate times from the same vehicle. Based on our discussions with other camera stores we do believe this to be connected to several robberies from dealers in other states.
Original Post
Midwest Photo Exchange in Columbus, Ohio, a Canon Rumors partner, was victim of a burglary this week. This follows a burglary at Veydra Optics earlier this week.
Camera stores have always been targets for thefts, but it seems there have been far more high value burglaries of retail and rental houses over the last few years.
From MPEX:
In the late night hours of March 15th Midwest Photo in Columbus, Ohio suffered a break in to their new facility.
This break in appears to have been pre meditated and carried out by experienced individuals. They strategically entered the building in such a manner that they were able to go undetected long enough to steal hundreds of cameras, lenses and accessories. Police and local detectives are involved as this break in is potentially a part of a larger crime wave going throughout the Midwest at this time.
Missing serial numbers are being tallied as we speak and Midwest is employing web scraping software to track them in the event that they show up for sale online anywhere.
Midwest Photo was able to quickly recover from this very unfortunate event and was only closed for a few hours on Thursday as they accounted for the missing inventory. Through strong relationships and great support from their vendors and customers Midwest Photo is conducting business as usual as of today. If anyone has any information please email [email protected]
If the serial numbers become public, we will update this post.