Thief breaks through Westboro restaurant wall, steals cash

WESTBORO - When Jonathan Richmond left work last Saturday night after 10 o'clock, he had no idea the crime spree that would hit his Westboro business was already in progress two doors down. Surveillance video shows the masked suspect calmly walking toward Westmeadow Plaza.

"This was very well thought out," said Jonathan Richmond, manager of JP's Restaurant & Pub. "He knew that two of these places the alarms wouldn't go off and he knew that both my front door and back door had an alarm and that's why we believe he went through the wall."

After prying open the back doors of a tanning salon and an Indian restaurant, the suspect can be seen on camera removing a register drawer. Cash was taken from both places. Then in the restaurant restroom, the suspect ripped apart the drywall, to crawl through a hole into JP's Pub. The place was trashed.

"Went through my drawers, broke open my safe. We had money there for the start of the day the next day. We had money for the past couple nights just deposits. He just went through everything and took it," Richmond said.

Suspect captured on surveillance video

The suspect was wearing a green hooded sweatshirt, dark sweatpants, sneakers, and a ski mask with holes cut. He was also wearing latex-coated work gloves. While police investigate, it's really stolen a sense of security from these small businesses.

"That's what the restaurant industry is all about. We take care of you, and you take care of us at the end of the day. So just to have him take that hard earned money that we got that wasn't his and he had no business to or no entitlement to, it's very frustrating," Richmond said. "Everyone here is just like family, so for this to happen - it's a gut punch."

Detectives in Westboro are in touch with investigators from surrounding towns where similar crimes have occurred.