BRATTLEBORO — Computer thieves have hit other education facilities in the area.
About $15,000 to $20,000 worth of specialized computers were stolen from the Windham Regional Career Center in Brattleboro three years ago.
“They showed us all the holes in our security system,” Director David Coughlin said.
Cameras and alarms guard the facility at night, but Coughlin said that the thieves operated similarly to those in the 1990 art theft at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston. Coughlin said the thieves entered during the day, hid until the building emptied out, then walked away with the computers.
The Career Center's insurance plan covered only a portion of the computers' replacement cost.
Coughlin says the feeling of being violated accompanied the theft. He described the facility as the teachers' second home.
The center updated its alarms, which are going through another update at the moment.
Coughlin says he believes, however, that the Career Center is a public resource and therefore needs to be open to the public.
“Bottom line, you hope in the honesty of people,” he says.