Bernalillo Business Victim of "Crash and Grab"

“We’ve been broken into before, but never driven into,” said Fawn Dolan, owner of Camino Real Antiques & Collectables in Bernalillo.

Dolan is convinced whoever drove a white sedan through the front door of the antiques shop just before midnight on March 29 did so intentionally. 

“Absolutely it was on purpose,” she said. “It was intentional, 100 percent. They were on a mission.”

The evidence is clear, she said. The car went straight through the front door and into a large, glass display case containing thousands of pieces of Native American jewelry, beadwork, prehistoric pots, moccasins and belt buckles, among other precious items. Many of the items date to the 1800s and a lot of them came from Santo Domingo artisans, she said.

“It’s all gone; long gone,” said Dolan, who has operated the store at the corner of Camino del Pueblo and E. Avenida Bernalillo for 27 years. 

Police did recover a necklace and two rings found later in an abandoned vehicle with front end damage less than a mile away.

More evidence comes from security video from a nearby business she says shows the car making a quick turn left and a quick turn right en route to plowing through the front double doors.

“The doors were 4-inches thick, solid wood in a metal frame,” she said.

Dolan got a call from police not long after the incident. She and her husband came to the store and ended up spending the night.

Insurance agents came by this week but Dolan said it would take a week or so to determine the loss. The display case, itself, was practically priceless. It was 8-feet long and had three tiers of glass shelves and dates to the 1800s.

Camino Real Antiques & Collectables has increasingly become a popular attraction for tourists and antique hunters. Dolan started the business in a former 250-square foot barber shop and grew it into a 6,000-square foot complex filled with a wide variety of antiques items, many of them Western and Native American, including furniture, wall hangings and unique household items.

Dolan said on Tuesday the store was closed while repairs were being made.

“Our goal is to have it open by this weekend,” she said.

Bernalillo police did not immediately respond to the Signpost’s request for reports related to the incident.