Palo Alto police are looking for a man and woman who robbed a jewelry store at Stanford Shopping Center at gunpoint, escaping with 25 high-end wristwatches.
"It was very brazen act, time of day, middle of the mall," Officer Brad Young said Wednesday. "Very daring...I'm very confident that we will put a lot of effort into solving this one."
Sgt. Brian Philip said Gleim the Jeweler employees called 911 about 4:30 p.m. on Wednesday to report their store had just fallen victim to an armed robbery.
Witnesses told police that a woman had an employee to show her some wristwatches. Once the employee opened the case and handed a watch to the woman, the male suspect entered the store with a semi-automatic handgun, ordering three employees to the ground, Philip said.
Then the woman pulled out a gun of her own. Witnesses told police she then went behind the counter and emptied about two dozen luxury wristwatches into her purse before she and the man ran away on foot. The exact dollar loss during the robbery is undetermined at this time.
There were no other customers in the store at the time of the robbery.
The robbery was captured on the store's video surveillance system, and a still image of the man shows he was wearing an ACE hardware white cap with a red bill, a navy jumpsuit like a mechanic would wear and a white elastic dust mask and white gloves. He is between 35 and 40 years of age, with a medium build and a beard.
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The woman is described as being about 30 years old, with a thin build and shoulder-length wavy hair that the employees believed to be a wig. She was wearing a United States Postal Service vest over a white T-shirt, and dark pants. She carried an over-sized purse with a flower design.
Anyone with information about this incident is asked to call our 24-hour dispatch center at 650-329-2413. Anonymous tips can be e-mailed to paloalto@tipnow.org or sent via text message or voice mail to 650-383-8984. Tips can also be submitted anonymously through our free mobile app, downloadable at bit.ly/PAPD-AppStore or bit.ly/PAPD-GooglePlay.
