GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. — Police are searching for two teens accused of stealing keys and cars from metro Atlanta gyms while posing as women. In at least one case, police said the suspects even went inside a women’s locker room.
Cash, credit cards and cars are just some of the items the suspects stole, but the strangest part for customers and employees is how they did it.
“What? Are you kidding me? Seriously,” Royce Evans said upon hearing the news.
The gym thefts that have been happening since just before Thanksgiving in Gwinnett County.
RELATED: Police: Man goes to gyms, steals out of cars, buys thousands of dollars worth of gift cards
Police reports show two Planet Fitness locations, a Gold's Gym and two LA Fitness gyms were all targeted. Police say the teens dressed like women and acted like they wanted to join the gyms. Then, they went into both men’s and women’s locker rooms.
“For a man to have to dress up like a woman to come in and become a thief is very creepy,” said one customer.
In surveillance pictures, police say that, at one point, 17-year-old Tarquinnious Mack and 18-year-old Dequavis Smith used what’s a “bump key” to remove locks from lockers and swipe car keys.
“Absolutely ridiculous,” Kim Comer said. “It’s very scary to know that I can't go to the gym and put my stuff in the locker and it be safe.”
A police report states Mack and Smith used the keys to steal gym member’s cars along with credit cards and cash left inside the lockers and cars.
“I usually leave my keys in the locker room,” Evans said.
Evans said that now she’ll take her car keys with her on the treadmill
“Along with my phone and everything else,” she said.
One police report indicates gym workers saw what appeared to be 3 men wearing women’s wigs go into the women’s locker room and then the men’s but they didn't say anything because they did not want to appear "transphobic."
“I'm actually slightly shocked because I don't really put anything past anybody nowadays,” Corey Williams said. “It’s kind of the world we live in.”
Detectives said the pair were able to use some credit cards at various businesses before they were reported stolen. Police added some of the stolen vehicles were recovered in Atlanta.
Anyone with information about the crimes is asked to call 911 or local police.
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