Hank's Fly Shop (Michigan) ROBBED!

[Mato Kuwapi]

I just received this notice via, Ann Miller and I thought I would post it here. Anything to make these things harder to fence.

From Hank's Fly Shop in Orion, MI. The store was recently robbed and many Winston and Sage Rods as well as Ross Reels were taken. Below is a letter from the owner, Ken Matheis. Please be alert to anyone offering to sell new rods/reels of these brands.
Ann


My name is Ken Matheis (hank) owner of Hank's fly fishing in Lake Orion. This past sunday June 8th Hank's was robbed. During the bad weather the store lost power and the alarm system was disabled due to lack of power. somebody entered the store and stole a substantial amount of flyfishing equipment. All of our expensive rods and reels were selectively taken. A crowbar was left behind the counter (it was taken by the police for fingerprinting). Quiznos is in our strip mall and an attempt to break into that shop was evident by the scratches and prying marks on their back door. Obviously done with the crowbar found in our shop. Thousands of dollars worth of Winston and Sage rods and Ross reels were taken. If any of the MFFC members have been approached to purchase any rods or reels etc can you ask them to let us know. I thought it better to go thru you so you can decide if this is something that your organization would consider to help us punish whoever is responsible for this sad occurrence. I thought I'd contact the TU chapters as well to see if anyone in the flyfishing community can help. Anything you or your members can suggest would be greatly appreciated. It's tough enough to remain open, without this violation. I have sent this request to you only. Please let me know what you would suggest, I have the police involved but I'm pretty sure with their agenda flyfishing store robberies may not be high on the priority list. Thanks.

Ken Matheis Sr.
President

[ausable_ny]

I HATE THIEVES Hope the police get them soon

[Ken Y]

Hope you find get thieves , and the equipment.

[MSD53X]

Hope you find get thieves , and the equipment.

Let's all keep on the look out !! I also have no respect for theives

[sagefisher]

Sage rods have serial numbers. I wonder if the shop has a list of those numbers?

Larry ---sagefisher---

[J Castwell]

Lets get those numbers and post them on here!!!!!

[flybinder]

I'd watch eBay and any and all fly fishing forum sites that have "For Sale" threads, that may have these brands of items listed at "give away prices".
Especially "sudden new members" that pop up, offering to sell Sage, Winston, etc. obviously.
A Portland, Oregon shop was robbed 3 years ago and the idiot thieves listed 50 items on eBay, within 36 hours of the robbery, it wasn't hard to catch them!

[Joe Valencic]

Thieves are not the brightest bulbs on the tree, so you can believe that they will do something stupid that will lead a well lit path directly to them. Very sad to hear about.

[Mato Kuwapi]

J.C. I sent an email to Ken asking if he would be able to provide serial numbers. Hopefully his computer is running.

[J Castwell]

I understand that we may have been of some help involving a large robbery in Texas a while back. Of course we will do here all we can.