Manhunt for masked thieves as thousands of pounds worth of Labubu dolls stolen

Police are searching for a group of thieves in masks who stole thousands of pounds worth of Labubus from a store.

Labubus come in all shapes and sizes, and some figurines have a higher value than others. NPR reported in June that a life-size Labubu in China sold for $170,000 at an auction with more than 1,000 bidders. The dolls have gone viral around the world with dozens of celebrities getting involved in the trend in recent months.

The dolls were first designed by artist Kasing Lung. He was born in Hong Kong and moved to the Netherlands at age 7, where he learned about Nordic fairy tales. Kung released an original illustrated book series in 2015 called The Monsters, featuring female characters called the Labubus. It comes after reports of a dad's desperate phone call moments before explosion kills him and his daughters.

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In 2019, Kung teamed up with Chinese toy company POP MART to begin manufacturing Labubu dolls. POP MART said that the revenue generated from the first Monsters series launch "broke the sales record in the art toy category."

The theft of $7,000 worth of the dolls took place in Los Angeles on Wednesday at the store, One Stop Sales, located about 18 miles east of Los Angeles. The LA County Sheriff’s Department told the AP that four suspects used a stolen Toyota Tacoma in the robbery, and the car has since been recovered.

One Stop Sales posted on Instagram that the thieves broke into the store at 1:30 a.m., taking all the inventory and “trashing our place.” They shared CCTV footage showing the robbery on Instagram.

The post’s caption read: “Today we got robbed, and they took all of our inventory, trashed our store, we are still in shock, if you guys can share this post please and help us find these [thieves].”

If you can't see the post above, click here.

Commenters came to the aid of One Stop Sales. One user wrote, “How can we help? Ive shared and reposted! But let's come together to help you guys bounce back!”

Another wrote: “This breaks my heart, yall were so sweet and nice to me when I came in . Head up, so sorry this happened to you. "Oh "I’m so sorry this happened to you. I pray they are caught and you get justice.” a third user wrote.