UPPER EAST SIDE — A burglar was caught on video chatting on his cellphone as he spent several minutes picking the lock of an East 85th Street apartment on Thursday.
A man wearing all black entered an apartment building between Park and Lexington avenues, at roughly 2 p.m. and begins to pick the lock of an apartment while talking on the phone, according to the video and the building's owner, Jonathan Lobatto.
The break-in was confirmed by the NYPD.
After the suspect hangs up from one call, another call comes in and his ringtone, Daddy Yankee's "Llamado De Emergencia," goes off as he continues to pick at the lock.
"It makes me sick to my stomach to see a guy break into a building and then case the premises while he casually takes phone calls from perhaps a wife or even his mother," said Lobatto, who's owned the building for more than 40 years.
"As the building owner I feel no different than any person that tries makes an honest living."
After nearly six minutes of working on the door, the suspect enters the apartment with a loud bang and later comes back out wearing a backpack he didn't have with him when he first entered, the video shows.
After seeing the surveillance footage on Thursday night, Lobatto was unable to reach the tenant of the apartment, who he says is a man in his 30s, so he did not know what was taken. Police could not provide any information regarding what was stolen.
Lobatto was first alerted to the burglary after his co-worker went into the building and noticed the damaged apartment door, he said.
Lobatto's co-worker reported the incident to police on Thursday afternoon, he said.
"He obviously did a lot of damage to both the front door and the apartment door," Lobatto added. "I hope someone recognizes him and this likely career criminal is arrested, convicted and sent to jail."
