MANSFIELD — It wasn’t what Paul Kemerling and his staff at Relax, It’s Just Coffee expected to walk into on April 1.
“We’re not entirely sure what we’re looking at here. It doesn’t appear to be a person, and we can’t explain how it would have gotten in,” Kemerling said April 1.
“We’ve always said our coffee brings people out of the woods,” Kemerling said. “We just didn’t expect that to be literal.”
On April 1, the staff at Grandpa Joe’s Candy Shop were shocked at their store security camera footage when they arrived for work.
“We’re not entirely sure what we’re looking at here. It doesn’t appear to be a person, and we can’t explain how it would have gotten in,” a Grandpa Joe’s spokesman said April 1.
Workers at the Buckeye Imagination Museum were stunned to hear alarms going off late Tuesday night, arriving April 1 to find evidence of a break-in.
“Thankfully, nothing was damaged here, and everything is safe. Local authorities were notified and are currently investigating the situation,” a museum staffer told Richland Source on April 1.
Mansfield artist Allison Pence spent the morning of April 1 examining grainy footage of a vandal who struck her work in the alley beside DLX downtown.
“The cameras were able to capture some grainy photos of the suspected culprit. I’m kind of flipping out about who, or what that is,” Pence said April 1.
(Even the Mansfield branch of the YMCA of North Central Ohio had a sighting on April 1.)
The string of reports had Mansfield police working through the night to investigate — and working to calm public concerns on April 1.
“We are aware of these incidents and have launched an investigation,” Mansfield police Chief Jason Bammann said April 1.
“At all of the locations, we have found several large footprints and in the access points of these locations, we located and collected large clumps of brown hair,” the chief told Richland Source April 1.
“Dawn Fryback with our crime lab is currently running DNA testing on that evidence.
“We did come across two witnesses to these incidents. It was late at night. They could not provide detailed descriptions, other than the individual was very tall and moved very fast. They could not provide definite descriptions,” he said April 1.
“We brought K-9 units to the crime scenes. But as soon as they got the first scent of the suspect’s trail, they wanted nothing to do with the task at hand.”
“I do not believe there is cause for public concern. These locations appear to have been targeted. I would suggest residents not eat any Jack Link’s products outside their homes until we can solve this,” Bammann said April 1.
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Readers may ask why this story makes repeated reference to April 1.
It’s relatively simple.
Some local merchants and organizations wanted to wish everyone a Happy April Fools’ Day. And the police chief was kind enough to play along.
