RUTLAND — Officials with the Paramount Theatre are offering a $1,000 reward for four staff laptops stolen during a weekend burglary.
In addition to the laptops, $300 in cash was taken, as well as a baseball belonging to a staff member that was signed by former Red Sox slugger David “Big Papi” Ortiz.
It’s the laptops that are most vital, Bruce Bouchard, the theater’s executive director, said Tuesday afternoon.
The laptops hold key information such as contacts, contracts and programming initiatives for the theater, he said. Customer credit card information remains secure, according to Bouchard.
“This unfortunate incident is bad for us, bad for The Paramount and bad for the greater community,” a posting on the theater’s Facebook page read. “We have no intention of pursuing criminal charges …… we are only interested in the return of our vital information.”
Bouchard described the laptops as four older model Hewlett-Packards. He said he has been checking with secondhand stores in Rutland to see if anyone tried to exchange the items for cash, but so far he has had no luck.
Word of the burglary spread fast on social media, with the posting as of 4:45 p.m. Tuesday having been shared more than 350 times, about five hours after it had been posted.
Bouchard said the theater is offering a $1,000 reward for the return of the laptops. The burglary took place sometime between Saturday night and Sunday morning.
“We were burglarized over the Easter Weekend and we are making a plea to the good nature of the people of our fine community,” according to the Facebook posting.
“The four laptops that were stolen contain absolutely nothing of value to the people who took them,” the posting added, “(T)hey are however vital to our operation and we need to retrieve them however we can and by whatever means possible.”
For more information, go to the Paramount Theatre’s page on Facebook.
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