“The one beside it is actually $1,000, so it was surprising to see him take the wrong one”: Thief steals $300 Epiphone instead of the $1k guitar sitting next to it in strange Canadian guitar robbery

Locally owned Acorn Music Store in Salmon Arm, British Columbia, is the latest target of guitar theft after a man casually walked out with an Epiphone Les Paul. The thief allegedly looked at the wrong tag and ended up taking a $300-400 guitar instead of the $1,000 guitar right next to it.

The store owner, Cory Bagg, explains how this all happened: “We had our employee working with some customers on their instrument and he was partway through the store.

“A gentleman walked past our window and walked straight in deliberately without pause, and proceeded to read the tag on the guitar in the window and then removed it. It was an Epiphone Les Paul Special in black matte, and he grabbed it and walked straight out and went booking and down the sidewalk.”

The shop staff is instructed not to chase thieves, but they were quick on their feet and stepped out to see which vehicle the thief was driving. In addition, the thief was captured on the store's surveillance camera and quickly identified by the local community as Peter Borkowski.

“Fortunately, for us, it was only one guitar. It's the way things can go sometimes, but definitely, we'd love to have it back,” said Bagg.

The thief isn't much of a guitar connoisseur, though, as he opted to steal a relatively cheap guitar.

“That one's in about the $300 to $400 range, so fortunately, it wasn't one of the more expensive guitars, although it does look like a very expensive guitar. The one beside it is actually $1,000, so it was surprising to see him take the wrong one.”

The stolen guitar – a Les Paul Special-II E1 in matte black – is Epiphone's best-selling model. It has a wide crossover appeal, with artists ranging from Taylor Swift to Frank Iero using it at different points in their career.

For more information and updates about the robbery, check out Acorn Music Salmon Arm on Facebook.