JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – There's a neighborhood crime alert in San Marco, where a thief was caught on camera stealing hundreds of dollars' worth of plants from a business.
Surveillance video recorded about 4:30 a.m. Thursday outside Fresh Health Hydroponics and Natural Market on Kings Avenue shows a man taking $500 worth of plants.
"Somebody came by, decided they were going to take whatever plants we had out here and take them for themselves," said Chris Henderson, owner of Fresh Health Hydroponics and Natural Market. "A number of them were in 250-gallon pots, and that's going to weigh more than 100 pounds. So to just willy-nilly pick that up, you have to have a little bit of planning, and that's why I think they had the U-Haul."
In the surveillance video, the man can be seen taking the plants behind the building. Henderson believes the man was loading the plants onto a U-Haul truck. An adjacent business also captured video of a U-Haul truck.
UNCUT: Surveillance video captures thief stealing plants from Fresh Health Hydroponics and Natural Market
After the plant shop's surveillance video was posted on social media, an employee of another nearby business said the same person may have stolen from them too.
It's also believed that the man seen in the video recorded outside the plant shop is the same person who went into Hurricane Grill and Wings on Hendricks Avenue -- just a half-mile away -- and stole tips from the bar.
Meanwhile, the owner of the plant shop is left dealing with the loss from the second time plants were stolen from his business.
"Unfortunately, we had the same incident happened a month ago and they didn't take quite as many plants," Henderson said. "So we got a security system installed and we got to see them on it this time."
Henderson told News4Jax on Friday that he will continue to keep plants outside, but is already looking to install a tall fence along the perimeter.