Jeweler, family held overnight in home invasion

Greece, N.Y.--Police in the town of Greece, a suburb of Rochester, N.Y., are searching for three suspects accused of keeping two jewelry store workers and their adult son tied up in their home for hours in order to rob the store. 

According to a Jewelers’ Security Alliance alert issued Friday, at 5 p.m. on Aug. 6 two armed suspects followed a male jeweler home from work and forced their way into his apartment. 

The jeweler, whom media reports connect to the Jewelry Lab in the Mall at Greece Ridge, was hit on the head, bound with duct tape and placed in one of the apartment’s bedrooms. 

The suspects then waited for the victim’s wife, who also works in the jewelry store, and their adult son to arrive home and bound them with tape as well. 

The JSA alert states that the following morning at about 8:30 a.m. a third suspect arrived. 

Two of the suspects then drove to the store, having obtained the keys and alarm codes from their victims. After the mall opened, they burglarized the store.  

Greece police remain on the lookout for the suspects, whom a local news report describes as “well organized,” and the family’s car that was stolen during the incident, a gray four-door 2013 Honda Accord.

A story published online on Aug. 8 by 13WHAM news states that police have leads on the identity of the suspects and the location of some evidence.  

Greece police could not be reached for comment Monday afternoon regarding the current status of the investigation.

While incidents of “tiger” kidnappings, crimes where store owners or employees are stalked beforehand and then targeted off-site, have fallen off the past two years after spiking in 2012, the JSA reminds jewelers to remain vigilant when they are away from the store.

Among the tips the JSA offers on the “Security for Jewelers at Home” section of its website are for retailers to remain wary of being watched or followed, vary the route they take home each night and have employees record anything out of the ordinary in a suspicious incident logbook.