Thieves Steal $14,000 Worth of Gasoline

CLEARWATER, Fla. -- A BP gas station here was the target of a gasoline thief, as police report someone stole 6,000 gallons of gasoline from the location in less than 23 minutes, according to a My Fox Tampa Bay news report.

Convenience store clerk Frank Zaitoun told the news outlet the theft came as a shock. "It’s something that’s never happened, you know. Never happened," he said.

According to the report, the station's tank monitoring system showed 6,000 gallons were removed Saturday between 11:12 p.m. and 11:35 p.m. Police spokesperson Elizabeth Watts said officers were called out hours later.

"There was a heavy smell of gasoline in the area. When they went out, they found a pool of fuel and the storage gas caps removed," Watts said.

Clearwater police are trying to figure out who's responsible for stealing the gas, but believe whoever did it knew exactly what they were doing.

"They knew how to get the gas caps off the underground storage tanks and how to get the fuel out so it’s definitely someone who has to know about the system," Watts said.
Zaitoun said when he and his manager arrived at work, they noticed the gas alarm was going off, indicating they were out of gas. When they checked the fuel pumps they realized thousands of gallons of fuel were missing.

Police describe the getaway vehicle as a silver tanker truck.

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