This past weekend, in an area where the sheriff’s log is known better for cows in the road than armed heists, Point Reyes Jeweler owner David Clarkson was bound with duct tape by three young men—one with a gun—and robbed of his wares.
“I am definitely not ‘ruined’ although this is definitely a setback,” Mr. Clarkson wrote on the local online forum West Marin Share. “But it is a heads up to all of you that our lovely little community is on the map. Not a good map to be on.”
A man entered the Point Reyes Station store late Saturday morning, posing as a customer, and asked to inspect a few diamonds, according to the Marin County Sheriff’s Office. A few minutes later, he was joined by two other men; all were white. One of the robbers quickly aimed a semi-automatic handgun at Mr. Clarkson and forced him into a back room, handcuffed him and wrapped duct tape around his knees and ankles—and, as Mr. Clarkson wrote, “helped themselves to everything I have worked for for many years.” The men appeared to be in their 20s, between five foot six and five foot nine. Mr. Clarkson told they Light that they seemed nervous.
The men absconded with jewelry from display cases as well as his cell phone, keys, wallet and money in two safes. (They left behind a brooch in the safe that once belonged to his ex-wife’s mother, which Mr. Clarkson wrote was “the ugliest piece of jewelry ever made.”) Then they left. Mr. Clarkson, as he wrote in a second open letter, “seal flopped” to the front door and screamed until two tourists came by and cut him loose. He was not hurt physically, save for bruises and swollen wrists.
“As you can imagine, it was kind of traumatic although I was calm throughout,” wrote Mr. Clarkson, who designs and makes much of the jewelry he sells, including engagement and wedding rings. “I found out that Diamond, my little Jack Russell terrier, will not defend me, at least not in this sort of situation.”
The robbers, in what would appear to be an amateur move, took his iPhone, on which a geolocation app was installed. Online, Mr. Clarkson watched the dot makes its way to San Rafael, then stop after the thieves dumped it—along with other items related to the robbery, including his wallet—in a trashcan at a Shell gas station on Irwin Street, which, like most gas stations, had a surveillance camera that showed the thieves throwing the items away. (Whether the footage can identify the robbers, however, is not clear.) The men had taken $20 out of his wallet, but left behind $200 that was slipped into a different compartment, which Mr. Clarkson had done precisely to throw off thieves. (“And guess what? It worked!” he wrote.)
Outpourings of support have since come in: emails, text messages, hugs and visits to his store. On Tuesday afternoon, as Mr. Clarkson assiduously swept dust from his glass display cases, two friends came by within minutes of each other to offering hugs and sympathy. “Breathe in, breathe out,” one person advised; another lamented a frightening crime in this “sleepy town.”
Mr. Clarkson, who has owned the store for 23 years, corrected her: “A formerly sleepy town,” he said.
He has also found comfort in his weekly improv theater class, in Corte Madera. “Improv saves people. It has saved me, it lets me express things that I don’t know are there,” he wrote in his open letter, adding, “I told the instructor that I wanted Monday night’s class to have the theme of Robbery, the whole class. It actually made me excited, really brought me up. It felt like I was channeling my negative energy, re-directing it. So I had something good to look forward to. And the class was spectacular… It wound up being funny and poignant and sad and freeing.”
The armed robbery follows a previous burglary—the jewelry store’s first-ever theft—just a couple weeks ago, on May 26, the morning after Memorial Day, when Mr. Clarkson reported that two white men stole a pair of expensive rings. “We are looking into the connection between the previous theft and any recent crime in West Marin,” Marin County Sheriff’s Lieutenant Jamie Scardina wrote in an email to the Light. No suspects are being named at this time.
Mr. Clarkson has no doubts that the thieves from late May were casing his business, either for themselves or friends.
The recent robbery spurred Steve Costa, the owner of Point Reyes Books, to add safety as a topic of discussion at an upcoming breakfast meeting of local business owners he is organizing next month. The meeting will also explore ongoing problems around trash, parking and tourism impacts, the original purpose of drawing owners together—but Mr. Costa hopes Lieutenant Doug Pittman or another deputy will lead a talk about safety strategies for businesses.
As for Mr. Clarkson, he did not have insurance, but estimates the value of the goods stolen—many thousands of dollars—equals what he has saved by not having insurance. Still, he faces the task of rebuilding his jewelry store’s stock. He said many of the stolen pieces—such as the more expensive wedding and engagement rings—had not been selling well. Moving forward, he will focus on making less-expensive jewelry.
“I’m not going to build it up the same way,” he told the Light on Wednesday morning in his shop. He was back at work, fixing a teenage girl’s mother-of-pearl ring by hammering the setting back around the stone. “I don’t want to attract that kind of attention.”
Mr. Clarkson said he remained calm throughout the Saturday heist, quickly realizing the robbers were not out to hurt him. In the letter he shared Wednesday, he remains composed. “So many of my beautiful creations, off to the melter,” he wrote. “It’s just stuff. That’s all, nothing more. So I’m letting it go.”