Philadelphia: 2,000,000 cents stolen from truck in Walmart lot | US News
Pennsylvania police are looking for a group of thieves who made off with about $200,000 in dimes from the Philadelphia Mint.
The brazen heist for an estimated 2,000,000 dimes took place around 6 a.m. Thursday morning, the Philadelphia Police Department said.
Officers were called to a Walmart parking lot in northeast Philadelphia, where a group of “10 or more men” were seen stealing items from a parked trailer.
“Officers from the 8th Precinct arrived at the scene and observed a tractor trailer with the rear doors unlocked and numerous dimes scattered throughout the Walmart car park,” a police spokesman told Metro.co.uk.
The truck reportedly had about $750,000 worth of dimes on board and was on its way to Florida. The driver had picked up the shipment from the Philadelphia Mint on Wednesday but stopped for a nap at his home in Northeast Philadelphia before delivery.
Police originally estimated the thieves got away with about $100,000 worth of coins, but updated that total to $200,000 on Friday.
Pennies must therefore weigh 2.268 grams US coin. If police estimates are correct, the thieves had to haul 4.4 tons of coins from the parking lot.
Thousands more dimes were scattered in the parking lot of the Philadelphia Mills mall. Footage from the scene showed police officers and other workers cleaning up the mess by hand and depositing the coins in plastic buckets.
Police identified two cars they said were linked to the robbery — a white Chrysler 300 with tinted windows and a dark-colored pickup truck.
It’s unclear if the robbery is linked to other thefts in the area. “In the months that followed there was a lot of cargo theft here and there in Northeast Philly and South Philly where we had lamb, chicken, TVs, fridges, etc.,” said Captain John Ryan CBS Philly.
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