Portsmouth family business seeks answers after breakin
Nov 18, 2024
PORTSMOUTH, Va. (WAVY) — A Portsmouth family-owned business is looking for the party responsible for burglarizing their business Monday morning.
The Phone Repair Guy store on Frederick Boulevard was broken into after 4:30 a.m., and the family said that between $20,000 to $25,000 worth of items were taken.
"He came to work to realize that the store had been broken into, so it was burglarized," said Nadia Sertyurek, co-owner of Phone Repair Guy along with Gokhan Sertyurek. "The cash register was open. A lot of electronics were stolen, including all of our inventory of cell phones [and] tablets. There was some customers' tablets as well, Apple watches parts, a lot of parts." want to tamper with anything or like, you know, mess up any chances of catching these guys."
They tell 10 On Your Side it took police some time before arriving to their store.
"I called ... 911 and it took them about 45 minutes, actually, for them to get here," Gokhan Sertyurek said. "I had to call them twice,"
As of 4:30 Monday afternoon, the family had concerns with the crime scene investigation.
"We were told that the detectives would call us in the afternoon sometime," Nadia Sertyurek said. "They still haven't come taking fingerprints or anything like that. We saw what items they touched, and so, we're still here. We still had some customers come in today, but we don't want to tamper with anything or ... mess up any chances of catching these guys."
The Sertyurek's explain how much inventory they lost.
"I hope that there's a thorough investigation done because the the total value of the items that were taken was a lot," Nadia Sertyurek said.
It is the family's hope that the community steps up and reports anything they know or seen regarding the crime."Just return them to us and just don't do things like that 'cause we're a community and we got to do better than this," said Nadia Sertyurek. "We really have to do better than this. And we can be better than this."
The Sertyureks are asking for help from Portsmouth Police. "So all I'm asking is, police departments to do their duty. Whatever has to be done, they should. So, I hope they will get caught. And then I don't want the same things happening to the other business owners or their businesses," said Gokhan Sertyurek.