A Gardena woman discovered a gaping hole punched through the back wall of her storage locker this week, the entry point burglars used to haul away roughly $300,000 worth of Pokémon cards, vintage clothing, toys and costume jewelry. No arrests have been made, and the thieves remain at large.
The burglary was reported Monday at a storage facility in the 1400 block of West 190th Street, according to NBC Los Angeles. The woman told authorities she found a hole in the wall at the back of her locker, the apparent route the burglars used to slip inside undetected and clear out her belongings.
LAPD officers responded to the scene and took a burglary report, per the outlet’s account, but as of the report no suspects had been identified or taken into custody.
Part of a Wider Southern California Pattern
The Gardena theft lands amid a wave of similar break-ins targeting trading card collectors and shop owners across the region. The Los Angeles Times reported that collectors and shop owners across Southern California have been targeted in brazen, sophisticated and sometimes violent thefts over the past six months, with losses in some cases reaching six figures. In one incident described by the paper, a collector was robbed at gunpoint outside RWT Collective in Sawtelle, with robbers making off with more than $300,000 worth of cards…