A brazen trio robbed a Manhattan Pokémon store at gunpoint – making off with greater than $100,000 in uncommon buying and selling playing cards – as dozens gathered for a neighborhood occasion, in keeping with cops and staff.
Footage of the surprising heist obtained by WABC reveals the hooded, masked suspects – sporting anime-themed backpacks – barging into Poké Courtroom on West thirteenth Road close to Washington Road within the Meatpacking District the place about 40 folks gathered round 6:45 p.m. Wednesday.
The crew, together with one suspect armed with a gun, used hammers to smash the glass masking the shows contained in the store, which simply opened in early November, the footage reveals.
Spewing threats as they raided the shop, the trio finally made off with greater than $116,000 in Pokémon playing cards, $1,000 money and a cellular phone belonging to a 27-year-old girl, cops mentioned.
The uncommon, stolen playing cards – the oldest courting again to 1999 and the latest from 2016 – depicted the characters Treecko, Charizard, Pikachu and Ho-Oh, in keeping with photos posted to the shop’s Instagram story.
“Everybody right here is protected,” Courtney Chin, the founding father of Poké Courtroom, mentioned in a video posted to the shop’s Instagram, with the smashed show behind her.
“All of our clients, staff and buddies, they’re all protected, so that’s the No. 1 precedence,” Chin mentioned. “Secondly, it was a extremely dangerous day. Clearly, we now have to do some clean-up.”
A girl who recognized herself as Alcremie Sundae, a Pokémon life-style and gaming content material creator, mentioned she was internet hosting a “high loader adorning occasion” on the retailer when the robbers struck.
“I’m simply shaken up,” she mentioned in a tearful Instagram video. “It breaks my coronary heart that one thing as healthful as arts and crafts for Pokémon playing cards may have one thing occur like this.”
The shop’s founder famous that the occasion had been its first ever, “now that we lastly have seating in our retailer.”
“We need to make this a protected area for everybody in the neighborhood,” Chin mentioned.
The shop was set to re-open round Thursday afternoon after some clean-up, in keeping with its social media.
The suspects had been nonetheless at massive.
