By Nicole Breskin and Patrick Hedlund
DNAinfo Staff
SOHO — A well-dressed armed bandit posing as a wannabe fiance held up a jewelry store in a brazen noontime robbery Wednesday and made off with three engagement rings, police and witnesses said.
The thief, dressed in a navy blue pinstripe shirt and dress pants, walked into Lunessa Designer Jewelry, at 100 Thompson St., just before noon and asked the female clerk to see engagement rings, police and a witness said.
“She brought them out, and he said, ‘Go in the back or I’ll shoot you,’” said Sian Anstee, 24, who works next door and spoke with the shaken clerk after the robbery.
Anstee, who was taking a cigarette break at the time of the holdup, said she saw the “smart-looking” robber exit the store and then dash down the street.
"He looked very respectable and nicely dressed," she said. "He did not look like a thug at all."
Police confirmed that the bandit made off with three rings.
The store’s owner described the jewelry as non-traditional and not particularly valuable, adding that the pieces sell for about $1,000 each.
“I honestly don’t think they’re worth going to jail for,” said Elise Perelman, 33, who’s five-year-old shop has never been robbed before. “I don’t know what he thinks he’s going to get for them on the black market.”
The man didn’t ask for money from the cash register, she added, and he didn’t attempt to obscure his face during the stickup.
“I don’t know what his intention was,” Perelman added. “Whether it was a spontaneous act of taking advantage of the moment.”
She said that surveillance video from the shop has been turned over to police.
“He held up someone for an engagement ring,” the witness, Anstee, added. “How romantic.”
