In what is being seen as a high-profile heist in the US, three people hijacked a truck marked for delivery at an Apple Store in the Americana Shopping Centre in Manhasset, New York City. The heist occurred in broad daylight to steal Apple merchandise valued at more than $1 million.
The stolen goods included hundreds of devices and other accessories, including MacBooks, iPhones, iPads and Apple Watches, the US federal prosecutors said.
According to the court records, the men were preparing to unload the merchandise when a black Honda Accord pulled up next to the delivery truck. Three masked men, armed with handguns, got out of the car and approached the vehicle. They forced one man back to the truck and zip-tied his hands. Another man was forced into a secluded parking area behind the building, less than half a mile away. He was later forced into the truck with the first man, whose hands were also zip-tied.
The heist was carried out in a Home Depot box truck, the authorities said. The surveillance camera footage showed the Home Depot truck trailing and stopping behind the delivery truck in a way that the cargo sections were aligned.
The Apple merchandise, which included iPhones, iPads and Apple watches among other devices, was then loaded onto the Home Depot truck. Once the theft was done, the delivery truck with the victims still inside was shut, and the thieves took off, the prosecutors detailed.
The accused have been identified as Alan Christhofer Cedeno-Ferrer, Michael Mejia-Nunez and Ennait Alexis Sirett-Padilla. They have been accused of hijacking the truck and stealing Apple products worth more than $1.2 million.
The Great Kitkat Heist
The Apple heist comes in the backdrop of the pre-Easter theft of an estimated 400,000 Kit Kat chocolate bars in March that triggered a flurry of memes and the PR campaign for the Nestle company. In a heist that was compared to the “secret service” style, thieves hijacked the truck in Europe, prompting the company’s Canadian arm to beef up the security with what many online users described as “presidential-level” protection.
Nestle deployed security escorts, guards across its stores, and even SUV convoys to ensure that its chocolates made it safely to the checkout line from the roads. “While some may find this disruptive to their day, we think it’s necessary security measures to ensure our wafer bars make it to retail safely,” the company said in a statement. Theives swiped an entire truck of the chocolate bars, roughly 12 tons of chocolate, on the vehicle en route to Poland from Italy.
Nestle has since launched a campaign to locate missing sweets using the batch codes, adding sarcastically that it “appreciates the criminals’ exceptional taste.”
Much like the Apple heist, the Kitkat heist was carried out with precision in daylight. The thieves allegedly posed as “police,” intercepted the chocolate truck and disappeared with the stock in what was later dubbed the “Hollywood heist.”
