WOODBURY, Minn. - After a minivan full of Chicago area men led five law enforcement agencies on a 21-mile-long high-speed chase ending in Woodbury last week, police have recovered $26,960 worth of purses snatched from a Louis Vuitton Store in Edina.
Louis Vuitton, a recent target for thieves nationwide, has reported more than $1 million in losses in dash-and-grab thefts, like the “mass takeover theft” that occurred July 1 at the Galleria Mall, according to the complaint.
Seven alleged shoplifters and the man behind the wheel of a black Chrysler getaway vehicle that crashed on an interstate entrance ramp were charged July 1 with felony theft in Hennepin County.
Woodbury controlled traffic at the intersection of interstates 94, 494 and 694, while other agencies questioned suspects in the public right-of-way.
Sixteen purses were recovered, some of which were still attached to their display stands by security cables.
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Over the police scanner, dispatchers called for Freeway Incident Response Safety Team (aka Highway Helper) assistance to search the interstate right-of-way for any stolen items that might’ve been tossed out the window of the van during the police pursuit.
“Heard that on the radio,” Kaylin Eidsness, senior communications coordinator for Edina police, wrote in an email to the Woodbury Bulletin, “but we don’t know if they were stolen items yet.”
With the aid of one of its helicopters, the Minnesota State Patrol, along with Bloomington and Edina police, engaged in a pursuit from I-494 to Highway 52 to I-94, where a Bloomington police car, one of two dozen law enforcement vehicles involved, stopped the suspects’ vehicle with a pursuit immobilization technique (aka PIT maneuver) on an interchange ramp.
The male suspects, ages 21-39, were taken into custody at gunpoint on an entrance ramp from I-494 to westbound I-94, according to the complaint.
Edina police were called at 10:09 a.m. July 1 to a robbery at Louis Vuitton Store , at the Galleria Mall. No force was used or implied in the theft, according to Jennifer Bennerotte, communications and technology services director for Edina police. Richfield police assisted but the other three agencies engaged in the pursuit. There were no injuries.
Edina processed the suspects at the police station and they were booked into the Hennepin County jail.
Felony theft charges were filed July 2, prior to a day off for the Independence Day weekend. The men might be part of a regional theft ring, Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman announced upon charging them.
Derrick Crowder, 22, William Curry, 23, Clyde Dobbs, 22, Thomas Gaston Jr, 22, Darion Hood, 21, Shawn Mondie, 21, Danny Robinson, 39, and Leon White, 29, all were charged with a single count of felony theft. In addition, White was charged with fleeing a peace officer in a motor vehicle. The eight were expected to make their first court appearance Monday.
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According to the criminal complaint:
All but White ran into the Louis Vuitton Store at the Galleria Mall in Edina just as it opened about 10 a.m. July 1. They ran through the store grabbing as much merchandise as they could and ran out to a waiting van with White in the driver’s seat.
A former security guard was parked in the lot and was suspicious of the van. When he saw the men running out of the store with merchandise and dragging security ropes and tags, he called police and followed the van as it headed south on Penn Avenue. During the chase the van twice swerved around stop sticks placed by officers.
At speeds in excess of 110 mph, the van made it 21 miles away from the store, but it was forced to stop in Woodbury.
Louis Vuitton stores have been hit with similar thefts throughout the U.S. and the FBI has been investigating. Police and the FBI have identified several of the men charged July 2 in videos of thefts at high-end malls in other states.
At least some of the description of the suspects in the Edina theft match the surveillance recordings of thefts in other states.
Upon questioning, more than one of the men called the incident a “family trip gone wrong.”
Others confessed when faced with surveillance recordings.
