AHOSKIE – Three suspects are sought in connection with an early morning crime here Wednesday that resulted in the theft of liquor from the local ABC Store.
Meanwhile, Ahoskie Police Chief Troy Fitzhugh said he will conduct an internal investigation of how a broken glass door at the front of the store, one located on the town’s busiest street (Memorial Drive), was not noticed earlier by his officers.

Fitzhugh said the crime was reported to his office upon the arrival of ABC Store employees shortly before 10 a.m. According to the surveillance cameras at the store, the crime was committed approximately seven hours earlier (3 a.m.).

Those cameras, Fitzhugh said, showed three individuals – all dressed in dark clothing and wearing white masks – breaking into the front door of the store. Upon gaining entry, the suspects reportedly stole several bottles of liquor and quickly exited.

The value of the stolen alcohol has yet to be determined.

Fitzhugh said that some evidence was collected at the scene of the crime, but did not disclose any additional information.

One member of the Hertford County ABC Board contacted the Roanoke-Chowan News-Herald, expressing frustration over why the break-in wasn’t discovered earlier.

Fitzhugh said his officers did experience an unusually busy night on Tuesday/Wednesday morning. He said one incident – a traffic stop that ended with an arrest – tied up one officer for over three hours. Another officer was investigating an incident at Commercial Ready Mix where a front end loader was reportedly missing. That piece of equipment was later found stuck in a yard of a residence on North Catherine Street, causing the officer to spend over two hours on that case.

“Just as one of our officers was beginning to make their normal rounds of businesses on Memorial Drive, we got another call of a vehicle located at Cash-N-Carry being broken in to,” Fitzhugh said. “He broke off his rounds to answer the B&E call and officers were involved in investigating that crime well into Wednesday afternoon.

“I’m still going to look in to this situation regarding protocol in making our normal rounds of checking on businesses at night in town,” Fitzhugh promised. “We may have to look into beefing up the number of patrol units on the street.”