HOUSTON — Cameras caught a man sticking out his tongue while stealing flat screen televisions from bars in Midtown.
Police trying to find him got an assist from a bar owner. However, it did not lead to arrest.
The man caught on camera showed up after hours with an appetite for a 55-inch flat screen TV. His short-changed servers are bars in Midtown. All of them use padlocked security boxes to protect their screens.
Still, Irish Cowboy got ripped off Saturday and Sunday. The thief stole three TV’s each night.
“We found broken pieces of lock all over tables,”Chaise Dykes, General Manager for Beer Market Company.
Two days later, the thief showed up 10 blocks south at Beer Market Company. He hopped a patio fence with a backpack, removed bolt cutters then went to work. Between snipping locks and wires, the thief took breaks and even made a phone call.
A white Dodge sedan drove up and hauled away two of the stolen televisions. An hour later, the thief came back wearing a different jacket but thirsty for more. He stole a third TV.
He never hid his face from cameras, though. Management is using that against him.
“There was something off with him a little bit,” Dykes said. “His tongue kept sticking out. He couldn’t really keep it inside his mouth. Most of the video we have his tongue is sticking out.”
Houston Police officers took reports. Several interviewed a man who looked like the thief. They made no arrests, though.