By Isle of Wight ObserverA take-away restaurant in Newport has been burgled and vandalised in broad daylight.
The Novo take-away and restaurant is a family run operation which offers a “relaxed dining experience” and has other locations in East Cowes and Wootton.
Manager Rebekah Miah and her mother were shocked to discover the backdoor had been forced open and the till missing when they came to open the store at 4.30pm on Monday (July 23). The family believe the restaurant was broken into between 9am and 3pm.
Thankfully, the Upper St James Street store is emptied of the majority of cash every night and so only £50 was taken from the till.
They will need to replace their till though which they have been unable to locate so far.
Rebekah Miah, Novo manager said: “Well we got in today at about 4.30pm and the back door had been forced open and the till itself with the cash float in it had been taken. It was some point between 9am and about 3pm we reckon.
“The bin men were here at nine so it was after that, and one of the people passing by saw the papers that he had dumped outside off the top of the till at about three.
“The till had probably about £50 worth in it, plus the extra cost of the till. Thankfully, we cash up at the end of every night so there is never much left in the till.
“There’s footprints in the building and there’s also a box which he has lifted off the top of the counter so they [police] reckon they could get fingerprints off that, but they didn’t know if they’d have a forensic team to come out and look at it.
“They said we’ll just have to wait and see if they can come out and look at it or not.
“It’s a bit of a shock really, my poor mum, she’s our head chef and she came in and said, ‘why is the back door open? Is anything missing?’ I said, ‘yeah, the till’.
“It’s strange really, because there is an Ipad in here and other things and they didn’t take any of that. They didn’t touch any of the alcohol or anything – just grabbed the till.
“We’ve looked around locally to try and find the till but couldn’t see anything.
“The funny thing is, that I think he tried to come back and take something else, because while I was on the phone to police reporting it, a gent turned up at the backdoor. To get to our backdoor you have to go around the the corner so you couldn’t accidentally turn up there, and he went, ‘oh I’m just looking for the hairdressers’. And he was bald.”
Hampshire Constabulary were contacted at 4.45pm by the restaurant manager and she has been given a crime reference number 441802785003.
Anyone with information is asked to call 101 quoting the crime reference number.
