A highly organized and professional armed robbery crew barged into a high stakes card game in Manhattan on Wednesday night, making off with over $100,000 worth of prized loot in under three minutes, leaving the high rollers and their host utterly stunned by the brazen heist, WABC reports.
The Poke Court, a sophisticated parlor opened in the Meatpacking District in November to serve the city’s elite Pokemon card players, was a mess of glass from shattered display cases after the brazen rogues absconded with its most coveted and valuable depictions of Japanese cartoon fighting animals that players pit against each other in imaginary battles, a most inauspicious first “community night” for the venue. At least 40 of Gotham’s top Pokemon sharps witnessed the crime.
“That’s been the recommendation of the police and of other shops in the area to get an armed guard or like a doorman,” proprietor Courtney Chin told WABC, adding she hopes insurance will cover the losses. She did not say if the merchandise was actually insured or if this was more of like an aspirational hope that the typical policies held by commercial retail business will cover it.
The NYPD are asking for the public’s assistance in identifying the thieves. They gotta catch em all.