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Thieves Steal $35K Worth Of Computers From An Oakland Elementary School

OAKLAND (KCBS)— Students, teachers and parents alike were stunned when they got word that 25 desktop computers were stolen Thursday night from Joaquin Miller Elementary School in Oakland.

The iMacs, valued at $35,000 that were purchased by the PTA, also contained school work that unfortunately wasn't all backed up.

A disappointed Principal, Paulette Smith, said the computers contained ancestry assignments and year book photos. Saddened and angry, Smith said she "finally broke down" around 3:30.

"25 computers is a lot of computers to carry out of a building," Smith said.

Thieves Steal $35K Worth Of Computers From An Oakland Elementary School

At 2 a.m. Thursday, a motion detector alerted Oakland Police Department to a break-in, but when officers arrived it was too late.

Parent Chris Haddawy said he plans to email Apple to see if they'll help with replacement computers.

"How do we get past it, you know? This happened. How do we move forward and get the resources our kids need to learn and grow," he said.

Smith suggests there were probably multiple thieves and they seemed to know what they were doing, including tampering with the motion detector.

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