A South Florida business owner says his demolition business took a hit when someone stole one of their machines off a job site.
Tony Stern, the owner of Riteway Demolition based in Fort Lauderdale, says they finished tearing down apartments on Northwest 20th Street and 3rd Avenue in Miami on Saturday. When they went to pick up their equipment on Monday, one of their machines was gone.
“It was frustrating, we work very hard, we didn’t come from a family of money, we busted our butts to get to where we are and to have somebody steal from us it hurts,” Stern said.
Stern’s daughter, Brittany, went to police to file a report. She says police gave them screenshots from a nearby camera that showed someone in a white truck driving off with their $50,000 TL6R Track Loader.
“I have jobs I need it on right now,” Stern said. “It always hurts because I paid for that machine, I put an engine for that machine, so that machine is $70,000, and we need it on this job, and if I don’t have it on this job, I’m going to have to rent one.”
Stern’s daughter posted the photos on social media, hoping someone would recognize the truck or see their machine, but he says a scammer reached out instead.
“Somebody tried to scam us and said they had our machine in Lakeland and they wanted money and they were going to drop the machine off somewhere,” Stern said.
The Sterns say they won’t let this setback slow them down, but they do want their machine back.
“It hurts the company, it pays our bills, it pays other families, and it keeps food in people’s mouths,” Stern said. “If you have our machine, drop it off somewhere and notify the cops, no questions asked.”
Stern says they’ve moved on to another job site in Broward County, and they could really use their missing machine. In the meantime, they’re going to take extra precautions moving forward.
Miami Police are investigating.
