A report that prompted social media speculation that SpeeDee Mart may have been robbed – or that its cash had been taken by police – over the weekend was false, Police Chief Jason Ogden said.
Social media posts reported that the store was unable to do cash transactions due to “the police taking all the money in the store,” at 1501 Main St., according to a police report. Facebook posts carried a variety of conjecture regarding the incident.
According to Ogden, police responded after the social media posts, and “officers determined that the claim was not accurate,” he said.
“The store had received a phone call from an individual falsely claiming to be law enforcement and attempting to convince an employee to turn over cash as part of a supposed counterfeit investigation,” Ogden said Monday. “The employee briefly removed money from the register after receiving those calls, but the funds were returned to the store and there was no involvement by the Sweet Home Police Department in taking any money.”
Ogden said the store owner had not filed a formal report as of The New Era’s deadline on Monday, “but the incident appears consistent with a scam.”