Thieves target pubs and restaurants in late-night raids

Money and alcohol have been stolen in a series of late-night raids on licensed premises in Knaphill.

The Crown and Garibaldi pubs, and Italian restaurant La Bella Amalfi, in the High Street, have all been targeted, with the crimes taking place on five consecutive nights.

It has led to calls for extra police patrols in the village.

At The Garibaldi there was an attempted break-in on Sunday night, causing major damage to some doors, and then at around 3.55am on Tuesday (February, 3) the burglar broke in, having broken a lock on a window to the gentlemens toilets.

The burglar was unable to force his way through further doors and into the pub itself, and he ran off empty-handed with the alarm sounding and the bullmastiff dog of Debbie Harlow, a borough councillor who runs the pub and lives upstairs, barking madly.

Repairing the patio doors and window will cost around 500, Cllr Harlow estimated.

Ive been here for 10 years and Ive never had anything like this before, she said. Normally the dog puts people off. Somebody is targeting businesses.

Around 20 minutes later there was a break-in at The Crown, from where a cash drawer containing 180 was stolen. Around half of this was in notes and half was in change and Ade Jones, who runs the pub with his wife Sarah, found a trail of coins in the street outside.

It is not the first time Mr Joness pub has been targeted.

In April last year he had 3,000-worth of wine taken from a garage.

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Thieves target pubs and restaurants in late-night raids