At 11:15 a.m. today, two youths in their late teens pulled up in front of Wiss's in a dark blue late model car with New York license plates. The sidewalk was crowded with shoppers.
One youth remained at the wheel, and the second, his face partly covered with a ski mask, his hands wielding a hammer, jumped out, pushed through the crowd, and when he got to one of the store's two jewelry display windows, began to whack away at it.
The stunned pedestrians stared. But inside the store Clifford Braman Jr., 20, of Orange, a management trainee, caught a glimpse of the youth and his hammer, heard the first thud, and rushed out.
"The guy hit the window a couple of times, but the glass wouldn't break. It just cracked," Braman said, "What he didn't know was that it is heavy duty safety glass, designed for protection against breaks."
The stubborn glass plus the irate management in the form of young Braman, proved too much for the hammerer. He jumped back into his car, slammed the door shut, and his friend at the wheel took off in a hurry.
"Went through a red light, too," said Braman.