Safe-cracking ex-boyfriend allegedly steals nearly $2,500 from Bluffton hotel, police say

A man caught on camera allegedly stealing nearly $2,500 from a Bluffton hotel safe early Monday was later identified by an employee as her ex-boyfriend, Beaufort County Sheriff’s deputies said.

The alleged theft happened between 3 a.m. and 3:30 a.m. Monday at the Suburban Extended Stay off Fording Island Road, according to a Sheriff’s Office report. The employee noticed the money was missing later Monday morning and checked the building’s surveillance footage.

She noticed that a man entered the facility through an locked side door. When the man approached the hotel’s front counter, the woman recognized him as her ex-boyfriend, the report said.

The couple broke up on Nov. 16, and the woman told a deputy that her ex-boyfriend told her he would be back to break into the hotel safe, according to the report.

The suspect jumped the counter and spent approximately half an hour crouched in front of the safe shining a flashlight on it, a deputy noted in the report. He then left the building.

The employee reported $1,625.27 in cash was taken, and an $821.22 check was also missing.

A deputy was unable to reach the man on the phone and later obtained three arrest warrants on charges of second-degree burglary, safe cracking and petit larceny. An arrest was not noted in the report.

This story was originally published November 22, 2017 at 1:23 PM with the headline "Safe-cracking ex-boyfriend allegedly steals nearly $2,500 from Bluffton hotel, police say."