TAMPA - The rooftop burglar police have nicknamed Spider Man may not be exclusive to South Tampa after all.
Two businesses outside the city in unincorporated Hillsborough County were burglarized between Friday night and Saturday morning by a man who went in through the air conditioning vent that serves adjacent businesses, officials said.
Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office spokeswoman Debbie Carter said detectives aren't sure whether the latest burglaries, along with 12 others in western Hillsborough since December, are the work of the burglar Tampa police detectives call Spider Man. That burglar, who police believe is both slight and agile enough to crawl through narrow vent systems, seemed to concentrate on businesses in South Tampa, hitting at least 41 since September. The two law enforcement agencies are now comparing the burglaries, Carter said.
"A lot of times, one crime is reported, and you get somebody who reads about it and decides to copy," she said. "So we don't know if this is the same guy."
The man who broke into Charann's Restaurant and the Hair & Nail Tech Salon, both located in a plaza at 6821 W Hillsborough Ave., was caught on a surveillance tape that can be viewed at the Sheriff's Office Web site, www.hcso.tampa.fl.us Anyone with information can call the Sheriff's Office at 247-8200 or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-873-8477.
