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Police investigate cases of landscaping equipment theft as Irma cleanup continues

By Samantha Manning
By Samantha Manning
Simon Weafer has worked hard to grow his business, TLM Landscaping, ever since first moving to Central Florida from London 12 years go.
"We had a lot of equipment ready for helping our customers and the community after the hurricane, so we invested a lot of money in chainsaws and stuff like that," Weafer said.
But on Monday, $10,000 worth of new equipment was stolen from two trailers he kept at a storage facility in Winter Garden.

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"It's pretty despicable. I mean, the people going out there to target business owners," he said.
The trailers were locked, but the latches were cut open.
Things like edgers, leaf blowers, weed trimmers and more were all stolen.
"We're having to come up with the extra $10,000 to replace the equipment, which we have to do. We can't wait until any insurance will kick in," Weafer said.
It's not only Weafer who has been hit recently.
Ocoee police posted a photo on Facebook showing a grainy image of two people getting away with stolen landscaping equipment.
Ocoee police have had 12 cases in the last week.
Winter Garden police are investigating Weafer's case.
He’s hoping sharing his story puts a stop to it happening to anyone else.
"It's not a pleasant experience to wake up to a phone call, ‘Hey all your equipment has been stolen,’” he said.
Weafer expects insurance to cover about 50 percent of the cost.
He said he had to postpone some appointments, so it’s delaying things for people still trying to clean up from Hurricane Irma.

Cox Media Group

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