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You can't make this stuff up.
Saturday around 5:15 AM, we had a burglary at the winery. They took our cash drawer (around $600 in cash), all four of our iPad's that we use as a POS system, lots of merchandise on the racks (most of them being bags that they used to carry out stuff), and a couple thousand dollars worth of hard liquor off the bar. We knew based on the fact that they didn't touch the wine that they were younger in age. We also were able to get good footprints (they entered through the construction fire exits upstairs where there was a lot of drywall dust that easily showed the tracks). They used a crowbar to pop the door. They also hung out in the building for 40-50 minutes. We also were able to get two fingerprints.
After reviewing the video (they forgot to notice there were cameras all over our building), we saw four people on the video. We had two good looks at two different faces. In addition, we had good video of their cameras and all four of their shoes.
Amazingly, the next morning at the exact same time, they decided to break in again! This time there was six of them. We didn't get any faces, but we confirmed some of the same shoes and also got some good clothes shots. It's amazing that they came so early, as police told us that robberies at that time are extremely rare. Not only that, but they hit the same place twice. My security is usually there between 10-3 or so, though it varies depending on the day.
On Monday night, I was at a local bar and brought up my Find My iPhone app on my phone. I entered the winery information and to my amazement, one of the iPads popped up as being online and gave me a location in a residential neighborhood 10 miles away. Better yet, the description said "Taylor's iPad". I went to the police in that town and informed them of the situation. They went door to door in that area, asking if anyone had recently got an iPad in the area. They came to a door where a dad came to the door with 8 kids in the house. The father said that he didn't know of any iPad, but would let them know if he found one. 20 minutes later, the police get a call from that dad saying he and his son are on the way to the police station. One of his kids had purchased an iPad from someone for $100. When I went to check the iPad and opened the settings, it clearly still had our winery name and e-mail listed in the settings. They told me they would be interviewing the kid after school on Tuesday (today).
This morning, I got a call from one of the detectives in town. I assumed he was calling about more leads in regards to the iPad. He said that they had a new tragic lead from early this morning. Around the same time that they had robbed us previously, two of the same people were up at a house hanging out. One of the men (I don't know exact age yet) had a pistol. At some point while he was holding it, it accidentally went off, killing the other person. The police showed up at the scene and ruled it accidental. While processing the scene, they realized the gun was stolen. They began asking questions and the man admitted that they had robbed multiple places, including a couple of homes and 'a haunted place'. They checked the video I provided and were able to identify the dead man and the other man in the robbery videos.
I'm not sure you could create a crazier plot in a reality series. Been a crazy weekend for me, but it looks like they should have all the suspects rounded up (or buried six feet under) later this week.
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