Surveillance cameras captured a thief making away with eight exotic snakes worth US$18,000 from an Omaha, Neb., pet shop June 17.
“I knew it was a customer,” shop owner Don Everson told WOWT. “They went right for specific things, they went right for the snake food to feed those specific sizes.”
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Video shows a suspect wearing a hoodie and carrying a bag running through the store.
The robbery lasted just two minutes.
The thief stole eight bald pythons, which Everson claims are some of the rarest on the planet, along with a supply of frozen rats.
“They were my babies, ya know I made these,” said Everson. “Most of those snakes there was only one of them in the world and I produced that with my breeding program here.”
The loss is extra painful for Everson as the animals were uninsured.
“Insurance companies won’t insure live animals, so products are one thing, but live animals aren’t covered,” Everson said. “So that personal hit is $18,000 out of my pocket. I might as well have thrown it up into the air.”
Everson told police he thinks he knows who the thief is — and he had a message for him.
“This guy is smart, he put a lot of thought into what he did,” said Everson. “If he did that at a regular job, he might get noticed for that and get a promotion or something like that.”