Mississauga restaurant owner crushed after safe with mementos of late son stolen in break-in

After surviving through the COVID-19 pandemic, Mississauga-based restaurant Capra’s Kitchen was doing well, but an early morning robbery this week has crushed that.

Owner Massimo Capra tells CityNews he received a call at 1:30 a.m. Tuesday from his security company that an alarm had been tripped.

When he investigated the cause, he found the front door had been smashed through, and a small safe and money boxes had been stolen from the restaurant’s office.

Capra said the suspects could get away with a decent amount of money as they had cash in the safe to hand out to employees that day, but something far more precious was also inside.

“We had a son that passed away four years ago. And there were all these mementos, a book with letters and all of the important information shared during his memorial,” explained Capra. “Everybody wrote something, notes, songs, stories and pictures and so on.”

Andrew was nearly 30 years old when he passed away, and Capra said they are still terribly saddened by the loss.

“We’re still trying to recover. I mean, our head is still spinning … and then things like this happen and bring it back again,” said Capra. “Having that taken away from us and all those wonderful words, wonderful poems, wonderful stories, wonderful pictures in anime. There was so much, and all of that is gone now.”

The restaurant shared footage of the break-in on Instagram, urging anyone who recognized the men in the video to reach out. Capra said he would also be offering a cash reward for the return of the items.

He tells CityNews the thieves got lucky as they attempted to break into a bigger safe in the restaurant but settled for the small one when they couldn’t open it.

“Either they got lucky, or they’ve been studying it … because we had a lot of cash in the small safe to be transferred out today,” said Capra. “That was all the cash for the waiters’ tips, which was substantial.”

Capra added he doesn’t care about getting the money back, only the items inside.

“Money is … you’re not going to get that back. I mean, that’s just as good as gone. But if they could give us back all the paperwork that was in there … that would be amazing, including the mementos.”

Peel regional police confirmed to CityNews a break and enter had been reported. The incident happened early Tuesday morning, just after 1 a.m.

The suspects are still outstanding.