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Beer-drinking, limping suspect caught on camera in pizza place burglaries

SEMINOLE COUNTY, Fla. — A suspected Seminole County smash-and-grab burglar caught on surveillance video may have walked away when he couldn't break the front window of a pizza joint, but deputies said he didn't give up.

"What I saw was just shattered glass, just coming into work," said David Lo, owner of Flippers Pizzeria.

Deputies said the thief successfully made his way inside the pizza place Friday.

Deputies said it's one of half a dozen restaurants in the Oviedo and Winter Springs area where they believe the same crook struck in the last month with the same M.O.

"He takes a hard object like a brick or a rock flowerpot, throws it through the front window," said Kim Cannaday with the Seminole County Sheriff's Office.

Orange County investigators believe he's the same man tied to two similar break-ins.

They said he normally gets away with $100 to $200 left in the cash registers.

At Flippers, Lo said the man didn't get any money, but did pause to have a beer and left his partially-filled glass.

"So not only did he break into your place, but he went back there, grabbed a beer, and had a beer before he left?" asked WFTV reporter Kenneth Craig.

"Yes, it was from a keg," said Lo.

In the surveillance video, the middle-aged beer-drinking thief doesn't cover his face and also walks with a limp. Authorities are hoping that distinct trait will help catch him.

Investigators said the man suspected of breaking in cut himself at several of the restaurants, so authorities hope DNA evidence will help catch him.