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SHERMAN OAKS : Record Store Installs Gate to Deter Looters

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Along Ventura Boulevard in Sherman Oaks, two music stores were targeted by looters during the riots.

Cheryl Colburn, a shift manager at Tower Records, said looters smashed through the store’s back door with a crowbar and made off with about $500 worth of compact discs and a television monitor.

“They must have been here awhile, because they were actually picking out the CDs, not just grabbing the first ones they saw,” she said.

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Colburn said the store has since installed a security gate at the rear entrance, which she said would make breaking in considerably more difficult.

At the nearby Guitar Center, store manager Peter Schuelzky said he lost an estimated $50,000 in merchandise during last year’s uprising after thieves rammed a car into the front door of his store. Stolen were two vintage electric guitars, a 1959 Gibson Les Paul and a 1955 Fender Stratocaster, valued at $25,000 each.

Schuelzky said he has since beefed up the security system, but declined to say how, adding, “I don’t want any would-be thieves to know what to expect if they come into the store this time.”

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