Hollywood police search for man who tried to torch beach restaurant

HOLLYWOOD - The owners of an iconic restaurant on the Hollywood Broadwalk are speaking out as surveillance video shows an arsonist hurling a Molotov cocktail at the back of their business.

The suspect is also seen on a new flyer from Broward Crime Stoppers in which they said there is a $5,000 reward and they show a photo of him and his red car. It happened at 4:45 a.m. on the morning of Monday, June 24th.

The Broadwalk restaurant has been in business for 22 years and the owners said they are baffled because they did not recognize the suspect or know why he tried to set their restaurant on fire.

Danielle Thomas, the co-owner of the restaurant, said "I feel horrible and scared and terrified. I am really worried. I have been here for 22 years and we have never had an issue before. I have no idea why he did this. We haven't had an problems with anybody. We are a family restaurant and we have known a lot of people for many years."

"I don't recognize him," she said. "He's just a big tall person who had big boots on. It would mean a lot to see him captured. I have been worried. In the middle of the night, I wake up and I look at my cameras and I check them through the night. This is nerve-wracking."

"For somebody that means to do that, this is something to be concerned about," she said. "He pulled up in the middle of the street. And he knew exactly where to go and what he was doing when he lit the bottle on fire and threw it at the business."

She said the damage was limited.

Her brother, restaurant co-owner Massimo Gramanzini, said "I have also not seen this before. But this was disheartening. Now we are just afraid this person might do this again and that would close down the business. Imagine if it had been worse this past time, this would have been terrible as we have 50 employees. What would they have done? This was rough."

"I have heard from one detective that they had another incident at another restaurant," he said.

Police have not confirmed that.

"It would be great if they captured this person. Obviously, we want to get the person who is committing the crime and see that he is put behind bars so we can get justice. We just want to know who it is and what was the reason for it. Was it a random act.? We don't know if it was. If it was random, it is pretty disheartening to have something like that. Obviously, we want him caught and hopefully the public can help get this guy," Gramanzini said.

Anyone with information that can help should call Broward Crime Stoppers at (954) 493-TIPS.