OAKLAND, Calif. (KRON) – The owner of Oakland’s Blunts And Moore dispensary near the Oakland Coliseum estimates that over a dozen burglars broke into his pot shop early Sunday morning.
You can see burglars looting the display cases in surveillance video obtained by KRON4 News.
It started around 5 a.m. with a sideshow at 66th Ave and Coliseum Way.
Alphonso “Tucky” Blunt says he has private security who called the incident into police.
Once the burglars started scaling the fence to the store, security arrived 7 minutes later to chase them off.
Alphonso Blunt who goes by the nickname Tucky says he is still trying to assess how much was taken, but he believes most of the product was dropped as the burglars ran away.
It’s a far cry from what happened to his business back in 2020 when his establishment was ransacked by what he believes was a much more organized gang of criminals while OPD was distracted by civil unrest following the murder of George Floyd.
But he says he’s heard about many other cannabis dispensaries and pot grow operations that have been hit over the past month, with many happening over the weekend following the acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse.
Blunt says cannabis business owners are fed up with paying high taxes and not getting much in the way of police response.
“We’re tired of talking. We’re tired of paying high insurance rates, excess security, paying for taxes. We’re talking about a tax strike potentially. We’re talking about picketing the mayor’s office. We don’t know what we can do, but it’s time for action.”
The Oakland Chief of Police says he plans to meet with cannabis business owners this Wednesday to talk about this past weekend’s crime wave and steps they can take to improve security at their locations.