A Decatur tea shop is fighting back against theft by ditching cash after criminals targeted their business and two others in a series of burglaries that struck the downtown area. Christine Nguyen, the owner of Rebel Tea House, made the decision following a break-in that occurred just before dawn on Saturday, as reported by FOX 5 Atlanta.
Near 5:30 a.m. on that fateful Saturday, Decatur police responded to alarms at the American Deli and Rebel Teahouse on E Ponce de Leon Avenue and a Dairy Queen off E Trinity Place, about a quarter mile away. Shattered glass windows marked the point of entry for the burglars who escaped with roughly $500 from Nguyen's tea shop. Surveillance footage retrieved from Rebel Teahouse captured two individuals, wrapped in black, making a dash after robbing the safe, managing the heist in just over a minute as Atlanta News First further detailed.
"It's supposed to be a really safe feeling," Nguyen lamented in a FOX 5 interview, expressing her frustration over the repeated break-ins affecting local businesses including her own. Nguyen is now counting on a "no cash" policy to safeguard against future thefts, hoping her patrons will understand the necessity behind this shift.
This isn't the city's first encounter with such crimes; police noted that eight businesses suffered burglaries back in January, and a custom grill was stolen from a restaurant on North Decatur Road in March. Nguyen added that American Deli had its own history of break-ins. The Decatur police urged anyone with information to contact them or Crime Stoppers Atlanta to help advance their ongoing investigations.
Nguyen expressed the heartbreak of watching her business being violated on camera, but rather than yield to despondency, she chooses to reinforce her haven with modern monetary mechanisms, a paradigm shift in her business model provoked by the dark churn of petty crime. Meanwhile, Decatur Police continue to dissect the surveillance footage, hopeful that some sharp-eyed citizen might offer a clue that leads to the swift closure of this open wound in their community.
