Police in Texas are looking for a woman who used a power saw to break in to a botox clinic and steal anti-aging products.
Surveillance cameras caught footage of the burglary, which took place at the Botox RN MD Spa in Sugar Land, Houston at around 8:25pm last Friday (August 23).
The woman could be seen approaching the front door of the building and unsuccessfully trying to pull it open before going to her car to fetch the battery-powered saw.
Watch the scene unfold here:
At first the culprit attempted to use sheer strength and determination to get into the spa but she eventually must have realised pulling really hard wasn’t going to do the trick and that she would need to get some machinery instead.
There’s no time stamp on the video so it’s not clear whether the woman had come prepared with the power saw or whether she went somewhere to retrieve the tool, but she arrived back at the scene in a light-coloured Mercedes SUV which she parked haphazardly outside the building.
The car did not have a front licence plate, making it difficult for police to track down.
She retrieved the power tool from the car and appeared to try and hack at different sections until she was able to cut through one part of the wall. The woman pulled away what looked like parts of the structure and dropped them on the floor before carefully removing a window pane.
According to ABC 13, after entering the building the woman left to move her car before returning to the spa and emerging with a bag and other items, including anti-ageing products.
Alonso Perez, the owner of Botox RN, described the burglar as ‘the average soccer mom in a Mercedes, trying to break into a business’.
He told ABC 13:
[She] had no regards for anyone else’s property, had no regards for her own safety by doing what she was doing with a power tool to a window.
The owner, who took 15 years to build up his business, said the spa had also been broken in to the night before.
He added:
Nobody should go through this. It’s not normal for a human being to take somebody else’s stuff, that they worked hard for.
It costs a lot of money to replace the windows. It takes a lot of money to have to buy cameras, to have to buy security.
The owner is personally offering a $5,000 reward for an arrest and anyone with information about the woman is urged to call the Sugar Land Police Department at (281) 275-2540 or Fort Bend County Crime Stoppers at (281) 342-TIPS (8477).
If you have a story you want to tell, send it to story@unilad.com.
Emily Brown first began delivering important news stories aged just 13, when she launched her career with a paper round. She graduated with a BA Hons in English Language in the Media from Lancaster University, and went on to become a freelance writer and blogger. Emily contributed to The Sunday Times Travel Magazine and Student Problems before becoming a journalist at UNILAD, where she works on breaking news as well as longer form features.