Owners charity may have aided burglars

A local business owner’s charity may have contributed to the burglary of her hardware store Monday night according to information discovered by Historic City News this morning.

Yesterday, Deputy Sheriff Jeremy Russell was called to the scene of Buzz Mart Hardware located at 9895 CR 13 South in Hastings to investigate a burglary that had occurred overnight.

The owner, 77 year old Joyce Dupont stated that when she left the hardware store Monday afternoon, it was left unlocked for a meeting that was to be held that night.

The group that was holding the meeting in Mrs. Dupont’s store was supposed to secure the building at around 9:00 p.m.

Because of the victim’s generosity in allowing the use of her store for the Monday night meeting, she intentionally did not set the burglar alarm that ironically she would need later that night.

When Mrs. Dupont returned to her store yesterday, she noticed insulation lying on the floor next to the side door. According to the police report, none of the Buzz Mart Hardware employees working at that time noticed anything amiss.

On further investigation, Mrs. Dupont also noticed the screws on the outside metal siding next to the door had been removed and someone had gained access to the building by peeling back the metal.

Stolen from the building were a water pump, pressure washer and two chainsaws in black cases with a total value of about $500.00 estimated at the time the report was filed.

Fortunately, Deputy Russell was able to obtain some latent fingerprint evidence from the scene. Deputy Sheriff Stokes reportedly saw nothing suspicious or out-of-place during his routine patrol of the area at about 1:30 a.m.

Detectives are working several leads and the investigation of this burglary is continuing.

Photo credit: Historic City News staff photograph