iPhone alarms turn thieves’ jubilation into outrage in seconds | US News
Looters who gleefully stole iPhones and other products in a night of lawlessness were left enraged as Apple disabled the devices.
The devices all began blaring, rendered useless to the thieves.
‘Oh my god, this is crazy,’ one of the looters can be heard saying in a video showing someone pouring what looks like orange juice over an iPad on the sidewalk.
Several other Apple devices are seen on the ground and one person appears holding iPhones in dismay.
‘Oh my god, these iPhones, oh my god,’ the same person is heard saying.
The video is captioned, ‘stolen ipads goin off’.
Earlier video showed dozens of looters inside an Apple store with ‘iPhone 15 Pro’ marked on the glass façade, grabbing devices as sirens sounded and cops cars could be seen arriving.
‘Free iPhones!’ someone could be heard saying repeatedly.
Police thus far have made 52 arrests from Wednesday night’s looting of stores in the Center City, Northeast and West Philadelphia, according to WPVI. All of them but three were adults, Jane Roh, a spokeswoman for the district attorney’s office.
Cops received a call around 8.18pm for looting at the Apple Store on the 1600 block of Walnut Street. No arrests were immediately made around the incident. The store recovered numerous of the stolen items, WPVI reported.
Lululemon and Fine Wine & Good Spirits were also ransacked.
A looter known as Meatball, Dayjia Blackwell, was arrested after sharing videos of the mayhem at the Apple Store, Lululemon and Foot Locker, then entering and stealing from a liquor store.
Violence broke out in the City of Brotherly Love after a judge dismissed charges against former police Officer Mark Dial who fatally shot black man Eddie Irizarry, 27, in August.
Businesses across the city closed earlier as police increased patrols on Wednesday.
‘The bottom line is sending a message that Philadelphia is not going to be the place where you can do this type of behavior,’ said Interim Philadelphia Police Commissioner John Stanford.
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