Empty gumball machine thief ignores cigarettes and alcohol

Martins Ferry police are sifting through evidence from surveillance video at the Convenient Mart store on South Zane Highway that was broken into at around 3:30 a.m. on Thursday. But what the burglar took is raising even more questions. The case is very unusual because the thief took a gumball machine that was completely empty - no gumballs, no cash, just the machine.



"We can't figure out a motive as of yet. The gumball machine was empty of gumballs and money," said Martins Ferry Police Detective Bob Walton. The burglar quickly runs to the back part of the store, directly to the gumball machine, then leaves the same way he came in. He targeted nothing else.

"When he left, he was carrying a 4-foot-tall gumball machine, so he obviously wouldn't be running straight down Main Street or Zane Highway," Walton said. "Our best guess is that he went back down the alley to where he was, to a house in the area, or to a waiting vehicle and he was gone."



But, the motive is still a mystery. "The store is a state liquor store. There was numerous bottles of liquor and cartons of cigarettes right there right beside the gumball machine and none of that stuff was taken," Walton said. He said if anyone spotted anything suspicious in the area early on Thursday or finds out that someone recently came to be in possession of a gumball machine, they are asked to call police.

Video.