KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — A Knoxville man was arrested and charged with burglary, theft of property and vandalism after breaking into a store and stealing almost $22,000 in merchandise, the Knoxville Police Department said.
On May 18, Cody Denning threw a rock through the front window of Underdog Collectibles in Knoxville and could be seen stealing 17 autographed jerseys, KPD said.
Surveillance video showed Denning entering the store twice, once at 2:15 a.m. and once just after 3 a.m., stealing jerseys from the store on both occasions, according to arrest records.
An employee said Denning was inside the store for around 10 minutes at 8:50 p.m. looking at the jerseys, the report said.
According to the report, Denning could be seen taking the jerseys off the shelves, looking at them placing them back on the shelves. As Denning was leaving the store, the employee said he heard Denning tell his wife that he was coming back for them, the report said.
The report also said that Denning attempted to sell two of the stolen jerseys to Pro Image Sports at West Town Mall.
Multiple hats were also reported missing that were later seen in the back of Denning's car in surveillance video, the report said.
Underdog Collectibles posted on social media about the robbery on May 18.
"Thankfully, there wasn’t a lot of damage to the store and the only things that were stolen were about 20 jerseys including the jerseys seen in the pictures," the store said. "If you come across any of these jerseys, please let us know and DM us for cert numbers so this thief can be tracked down."
Underdog Collectibles said that nobody was hurt during the robbery, but asked again for assistance in locating the missing jerseys.