Howard County police say nine businesses were burglarized overnight Oct. 11-12, with entry made through broken glass doors or windows, according to the department’s crime bulletin. Reported losses varied: 108 Wine & Spirits in Clarksville lost lottery tickets, while High’s in Fulton reported stolen cash and tobacco products. The affected businesses spanned several parts of the county.
Investigators believe two suspects traveling in a vehicle were involved, and police asked residents and business owners to review security-camera footage, CBS Baltimore reported. The available account does not establish a connection between this case and earlier commercial burglaries in the county.
A separate earlier case
Commercial burglaries have also been the subject of past Howard County investigations. In a separate case, police said four Ellicott City businesses were burglarized between Jan. 1 and 3, 2017, and three local suspects were charged, according to a department release. That case is a historical example, not evidence that the incidents are related.
What county crime figures can—and cannot—show
Howard County’s HocoDash dashboard puts the county’s 2024 property crime rate at 1,662 per 100,000 residents, compared with Maryland’s 2,050. The measure combines burglary with theft, auto theft and arson, so it does not isolate business burglaries or show how their frequency has changed. The dashboard’s figures therefore provide broad context, not a measure of this type of incident.
Year-to-year comparisons also have a reporting caveat: Howard County police switched from Summary Reporting to the National Incident-Based Reporting System in 2022, a change the department says can complicate comparisons across that year. The department’s crime-statistics page describes the change.
