More than a dozen would-be burglars attempted to break into the storage room of a downtown Los Angeles bike shop over the weekend by repeatedly ramming a U-Haul truck into the wall of the facility.
The attempted burglary occurred at Just Ride L.A., a bike shop located near the corner of South Hill Avenue and Venice Boulevard around 6:00 a.m. Saturday, according to a co-owner of the store, Danny Farahirad.
“My guys were like, ‘Hey, someone rammed a truck… they just kept ramming the U-Haul through our gate,’” he said. “There were 16 people. They were somewhat organized.”
Security video shows the U-Haul van driving straight through the closed gate, which blocks motorists from entering the shop’s parking lot, ripping the gate from its hinges.
A crew of people who appeared to be with the drivers of the U-Haul descended on the lot as the U-Haul repeatedly crashed into the back of the bike store. The burglars did not successfully access the storage area.
Farahirad said about $40,000 in damage was done to the shop. Just Ride L.A. will have to buy a new rolling gate, awning and light fixture, Farahirad said.
Farahirad said that the attempted burglary was just another blow in what’s already been the bike shop’s “slowest year in history.”
After a surge in e-bike purchases during the pandemic, Farahirad said, sales have been sluggish since mid-2022.
“This doesn’t help,” he said.
Other Southern California bike shops have also been recent victims of crime. In September, a bike shop in Irwindale had $40,000 worth of merchandise stolen. Two people were arrested in March for allegedly participating in numerous bike shop robberies.
It was not the first time that Just Ride L.A. has been targeted, Farahirad said: It was once the target of an armed robbery, and about 10 bikes have been stolen over the course of the shop’s existence.
In the burglars had gotten in on Saturday, Farahirad said, tens of thousands of dollars of merchandise could have been stolen.
Even though a group of plainclothes detectives visited the shop Tuesday, Farahirad said, he is not hopeful that police will be able to capture the people responsible for the burglary.
No arrests have been made.
This story originally appeared on LA Times
