New York City police are asking for the public's help to identify a would-be thief who allegedly tried to steal the $100,000 Cathedral of St. John the Divine statue last week.
Police released footage of a 45- to 50-year-old man with a light complexion, the New York Daily News reported Sunday.
The man, dressed in all black, showed up in footage at the Manhattan Episcopal Church on Amsterdam Ave. on Dec. 3, where he attempted to lift one of the cathedral's statues before he was spotted by security and ran off, according to police.
The statute he targeted is worth an estimated $100,000.
The 5,000-capacity church is considered the world's largest Gothic cathedral, famed for its annual Blessing of the Animals.
It has been targeted by arson, was been rebuilt after a 2001 fire, and was damaged again by a fire in 2019. During the 2020 Black Lives Matter riots targeting police, cops shot and killed a gunman waving two pistols on the steps of the cathedral, according to the Daily News.
Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
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