Washington's Navy Yard neighborhood is on high alert after a brazen retail theft at a local CVS store. Metropolitan Police Department's First District detectives are turning to the public for help in catching the culprits who, on the evening of April 16, orchestrated a bold shoplifting operation.

According to the Metropolitan Police Department, at around 8:45 p.m., a group of individuals descended upon the CVS located in the 1100 block of New Jersey Avenue, Southeast, their intentions set on thievery. The masked suspects swiped goods from the shelves, pocketing merchandise without the slightest intention of payment. When confronted by a diligent but ultimately endangered security guard, their retreat included not just stolen items, but an audacious assault of the throwing variety – though, the missile, a bottle, sailed harmlessly wide of its human target.

Indeed, the security guard walked away unscathed, a small mercy in an incident that reveals larger societal ills. The surveillance footage, now in possession of the police but not yet released to the public, could contain the key to unmasking these individuals brazen enough to flout the law in pursuit of what, objects? Commodities? And in their pockets, stolen more than goods – peace of mind from workers just earning their daily wage and safety presumed by the community.

The Metropolitan Police are urging anyone with information to come forward, assuring anonymity to those who seek it. Tips can be submitted through a variety of channels, from a call to the department directly to scrawling messages in the digital tip lines that now seem, more than ever, the lifeblood of community-oriented policing – connecting the watchful eyes of a neighborhood with the swift action of law enforcement, their sinew and backbone tasked with maintaining order amidst a landscape that some see fit to disrupt with impunity.