AC Unit Stolen From Wilson’s Book World Will Cost $10K To Replace

ST. PETERSBURG, FL — The owner of Wilson’s Book World was shocked when she arrived to open the shop Saturday morning and found that her air conditioner had been stolen overnight.

“After parking, I looked at the building and looked at the mailbox and thought, ‘Hmm, that looks rather empty,’” Michelle Jenquin, the bookstore’s third-generation owner, told Patch. “It was like, ‘five, four, three, two, one — oh my god, my AC unit is missing.’”

As much as it’s an “entertaining weird Florida story,” the theft is a significant setback for the small business, she said.

It will cost Jenquin at least $10,000 to recover from the loss. A new unit will run anywhere from $7,000 to $8,000. She also plans to build an enclosure around it so thieves won’t be able to access it easily in the future.

Then, there’s the electrical damage to consider. The thieves cut through live wires to remove the unit, which affected power to portions of the store.

They spent much of Saturday tracking down the live wires and ensuring that the wiring in the building was safe, Jenquin said.

She hopes to have a new unit installed Tuesday, but that depends on the status of the building’s wiring. In the meantime, the bookstore is closed.

“We might not open again until Wednesday, Thursday, and even that depends,” she said. “It could be more like Friday.”

Jenquin said she doesn’t normally like to ask for assistance, but now, she has no choice. She’s set up a GoFundMe fundraiser for the building’s new AC unit. As of Saturday night, she’s raised a little more than $3,000 of a $10,000 goal.

“It’s been disheartening,” she said. “Times are so hard as it is right now. Everybody is just getting by. So, yeah, it’s a little disheartening; it kind of hurts.”

Jenquin added, “Who the (expletive) steals an AC unit?”