Last week, one campus restaurant and one Ohio State student lost pieces of OSU memorabilia to theft.
On Sunday, Sept. 17, student Evan Jablonka reported the theft of a Big Ten Championship ring and on Monday, Sept. 18, Eddie George’s Grill 27 reported the theft of several football jerseys. Together, all items amounted to about $6,600.
According to police reports, Jablonka, a 20-year-old student from Pickerington, reported that the incident occurred between Sept. 16 and Sept. 17, at his residence on Frambes Avenue. Jablonka was a punter on the 2005 football team, which shared the Big Ten title with Penn State.
According to police reports, the ring, engraved with the block “O” and bearing Jablonka’s name and jersey number, is valued at $5,000. Jablonka could not be reached for comment.
On Sept. 18 around 6 p.m., Eddie George’s Grill 27 had several jerseys stolen by a woman during open hours, in clear view of customers.
“Eddie was here socializing, and he signed the woman an autograph,” said Terry McLaughlin, manager at Eddie George’s Grill 27. “She went back to the bar and saw that Eddie had his back to her and saw the door to Eddie’s VIP private room was open. She ran in the room, grabbed the jerseys and took off.”
According to McLaughlin, some of the jerseys were signed by George, and the entire collection the woman took was valued around $1,600. A customer took notice as the suspect fled the scene.
“A customer saw her steal them and … alerted the manager that was working that night,” McLaughlin said.
Although the suspect escaped the scene without being detained, she may only enjoy her new Eddie George collection for a short while.
“We actually know who she is,” McLaughlin said. “We have her credit card number because she left an open tab here at the bar. So if that’s her real credit card, it shouldn’t be long until they get her.”
Incidents of stolen memorabilia do not occur often; In fact the University Police does not keep a special count on stolen memorabilia.
“We don’t keep a separate record on those kinds of things,” said Rick Amweg, assistant chief of OSU police. “So anything I can say would be from sheer recollection, and I really can’t recall anything like that happening here recently on campus, if at all.”
Pam Temple, records manager for the OSU police, said that although there have been no major thefts like this in the past, there are still memorabilia stolen, but on a much smaller scale.
“Normally the main things that are stolen are OSU T-shirts, and stuff like that, are stolen from gift shops around here,” she said.
