It looked as if someone had beaten in the front door of Bike N Sport with sledgehammers sometime the previous night.
“The front door [when I arrived in the morning] was, like, totally knocked in,” said Brian Distolhorst, the inventory manager at the Cordova Road bicycle business. “The door frame was literally busted out of the wall.”
This was Aug. 12, a flashpoint for Bike N Sport in a summer where concerns about break-ins and thefts at its location in the Coronado shopping center have run high. That night, when a group apparently pounded its way into the shop, it marked the culmination of weeks of fears related to burglary.
“I would say that for a number of weeks leading up to what happened in August, it started off with people trying to throw rocks through the front door, people trying to bash rocks through the front door, trying to take a crowbar to the front door,” said Distolhorst.
The burglary brings into focus how local bike shops in Santa Fe have had to tighten their security in recent years amid concerns related to thefts and burglaries, with Distolhorst calling the situation “a plague for bike shops here in town.”
More than that, it has been a summer where outraged residents of the city have vented frustrations about crime and homelessness at forums held by members of City Council, including most recently one on Tuesday night.
It appears a blunt object was used to force entry into the store, according to Santa Fe police Lt. Jimmie Montoya, who said police responded to a report of a burglary at the shop that day.
“I would say it was maybe four [to] six guys. We do have video. But it was dark. They broke in and stole some kids’ bikes and an adult tricycle because everything else is locked up,” Distolhorst said.
Bike N Sport had started to take extra precautions before that night, locking almost all of the bikes up in the store upon closing each day to guard against major losses in the event of successful forced entry. That meant just a couple of bicycles were stolen that night. The store has ramped up security even more since the incident, adding a door that has sensors that will notify shop owners if it is tampered with after-hours.
Police blame rises in drug use and homelessness, as well as repeat offenders who aren’t being jailed or have been released, for violence, vandalism, thefts and other problems that have continued to plague residents and businesses across the city.
Police have stepped up patrols in the area of Bike N Sport, police Chief Paul Joye wrote in an email Wednesday evening, and have conducted about 30 “close patrols,” which he wrote are “proactive measures taken by officers to deter crime, as well as potentially catch criminals in the area,” since Aug. 13.
From January to July, city police have arrested or charged 343 people with theft, including shoplifting, Joye wrote.
“Many of those charged have been repeat offenders,” Joye wrote.
Mike Chapman, the owner of the Broken Spoke, said his store suffered two break-ins last year at its location off Cerrillos Road, prompting him to beef up security.
“It’s like Whac-A-Mole,” said Chapman. “Every time we get broken into, we [increase security] and don’t get broken into the same way. But they find another way.”
He echoed anxieties expressed at Bike N Sport, calling such concerns “constant” and noting bikes can be expensive and quickly turned into cash.
Tennyson Hulcy, who owns Rob and Charlie’s Bike Shop, said the outside of his store is outfitted with metal barriers in an attempt to deter late-night break-ins.
But in early July, two employees of the store on St. Michael’s Drive were pepper sprayed by a woman who was in the process of stealing a bike, Hulcy said. His employees were not injured in the incident, but it has deepened concerns in the local bike shop community.
“Basically, she was taking off towards the door, and the employee grabbed the wheel and said ‘Yes, ma’am, can I help you?’ And she turned around and pepper sprayed him and the other staff member standing near there,” explained Hulcy.
“We were like, ‘What happens next?’ ” he added.
Hulcy said that while he supports the police, he has not seen quick responses from them recently. He said it took city police two days to respond to the pepper-spray attack.
“My guys know to call 911, and if there’s an assault going on inside the store or outside the store, who do they call if they can’t rely on them to come help?” Hulcy said.
Joye wrote Wednesday that The New Mexican asking him about it was “the first that command staff have been notified that there was such a delay in the response” and he had directed a patrol captain to look into the reason for the delay.
“I’m 100% behind the police, but in my opinion, we need to figure out a way to help [the police],” Hulcy added. “I don’t know what that answer is — people, money — but I feel like we need to help those guys to address the bigger problem, and then I feel like retail crime will take a step back.”
Distolhorst had similar thoughts. The incident at Rob and Charlie’s, he said, represents a clear escalation in terms of local retail theft. He said there have been the “middle of the night and smash-and-grab” burglaries, and then there are the individuals who may try to dash out the door of a shop with a bike, a quick score.
“That was kind of like what was going on, but earlier this summer, shop employees are getting maced,” Distolhorst said.
Many Santa Fe businesses, not just bike shops, have expressed concerns about retail theft. In a June meeting of the New Mexico Organized Retail Crime Association, a group organized by the New Mexico Chamber of Commerce, Santa Fe retailers said losses from their stores have increased recently.
An increase in felony shoplifting charges this month in Santa Fe — including a few for the newly legislated offense of “organized retail crime” — indicates police and prosecutors in the capital city have been cracking down. Earlier this summer, the state Department of Justice filed organized retail crime charges against four people in Santa Fe, saying they were running such a “fencing” ring out of a house on Calle la Resolana.
Santa Fe police are part of the state Department of Justice’s organized retail theft task force. Joye said he and his detectives “have met with members of the Chamber of Commerce to discuss target-hardening ideas for businesses, and especially, to get the word out about the New Mexico Organized Retail Crime Association which uses their Auror platform [an online information-sharing platform for retailers] to help identify and prosecute retail theft suspects.”
Distolhorst said each time Bike N Sport gets broken into, it hurts the small business.
“If people think it’s harmless to take a few bikes, it hurts the bike shops deeply,” Distolhorst said. “We’re trying to provide a service for the community and it takes a chunk out of us. It’s like pound to flesh.”
