re: A neighboring business got robbed by gypsies

In high school I worked in a grocery store in a small town in Wisconsin and about once a year the gypsies would come through the town and flood the various stores and divert the attention of the staff and steal whatever wasn't tied down. One year they pulled into the lot of the grocery store and the owner yelled "the gypsies are here!" and we battened down the hatches, locking all the doors and stood guard. Apparently the store owner had received a call from another merchant warning him they just ransacked his store. It was a strange scene, a showdown between packs of people sitting in cars in the parking lot waiting for us to open the doors while we were peering through the windows, watching their every move. Eventually they would move on.

The local paper here in Scottsdale published a story a few years ago where the gypsies would come to town and would take their children to local physician offices, feigning illness, and hospitals and then cause a commotion. While the staff was distracted they would steal anything & everything- gauze sponges, toilet paper, soap dispensers, pens, paper, etc.- whatever they could get their hands on.