CLEVELAND, Ohio — It's not a cliche to say that the rundown building that once housed a precious stones store on Lorain Avenue, near the west end of Cleveland's Antique Row, was, for Aaron Pearl and his wife, Lisa Anne Carlini, a diamond in the rough.

But the cop cars were not a good sign.

The Cleveland couple exited the highway Saturday night to see the place -- which they'd been working to turn into a coffee shop and local foods mecca -- surrounded by cops.

Everything of value had been extracted by scrappers. Two furnaces, one brand new. Most of the new electrical wiring. Copper pipes, even those hidden in the walls. Broken plaster and lath boards testified to the thieves' muscular determination. They even took the kitchen sink – two actually – from the apartments upstairs. Bathtubs, too.

The dream had been for Pearl, who roasts coffee beans in his spare time, to serve the best cup of coffee in Cleveland there in a shop called Origins and for Carlini to sell the food she grows at the Kinsman Farm, where she controls a quarter acre of fertile land. More than that, it would be a place for the West Side neighborhood to gather. Maybe it would be the spark that could ignite the kind of excitement seen in the nearby Gordon Square district. Maybe an area locals know as the "Crack Triangle" would move in a better direction.

That seemed like such a distant possibility Saturday as Pearl, who teaches philosophy at Cleveland State University and Lakeland Community College, and Carlini, who devotes much of her time to the farm, walked through the rubble fighting back tears.

"We drive by it every day. From the outside, from the front, everything looked fine," he said. Thieves used the back door, with ready access to an alley behind the property.

He's kicking himself about that. It had been maybe a month since he or Lisa had been inside. They live a short walk away, but he hasn't stopped by lately. There was no alarm system. And because the place was all chaos with renovations, he carried no insurance.

Pearl sat down at his computer and poured out his soul on Facebook and on the other social media sites to which he belongs, a local poker bulletin board and another for those who home brew beer.

"An Open Letter to Everyone I know," it began, "I am literally crying as I sit down to write this."

Pearl worked through his anger and his desperation in that missive:

"I don't completely blame the people that cleaned us out. First of all, I understand that this was a desperate act done by desperate people," he wrote. The philosopher struggling with the angry victim. "Not that I don't want to take a club to the scumbags that did this to me."

He acknowledge his own failings in trying to prevent the theft and he vented about how a building inspector tracked him to his home in the past when there was a question about a permit. But police never called, even after neighbors of the property said they alerted them that looters had been there. Cleveland Police did not respond to a request for information before deadline for this story.

Cleveland Police detectives were there taking photographs Tuesday. A neighbor arrived a short time later carrying a baseball bat. He thought the thieves might be back.

"For four weeks they've been coming in here at all hours of the day. Five different guys," said the neighbor, who was too leery of retaliation to give detectives his name. "I've got to come home three times a day from work just to check my house. It's uncalled for, this craziness."

Some of Pearl's friends have been supportive. Others have told him Cleveland's a lost cause and he's crazy to stay.

But they don't want to give up.

"I love Cleveland and I want to make something out of this neighborhood," Pearl said.

But urban farming and part-time teaching – no benefits – aren't exactly lucrative. They lack the means to get to the ends they desire.

So his Facebook posting came with a plea:

"We now have a somewhat gutted space in the Antiques District of Cleveland proper, ripe for ideas and desperate for resources from those who want this area to move in a more positive direction," he wrote.

"Solutions of mutual benefit," he calls it.

Perhaps the building could be a showcase for an alternative energy provider, a community kitchen could be built in the basement to benefit locals; maybe designers, artists and tradespeople would want to leave their mark. Heck, if HGTV wants to bring a crew in and renovate it for cable TV, Pearl figures there's a powerful back story.

"Ultimately, I'm most interested in working with individuals and organizations that can realize some benefit by helping this dream to become a reality," he said. "I'm calling it creative solutions of mutual benefit."

Got an idea? He's on Facebook at Origins Beanery or you can send e-mail to originsbeanery@gmail.com.

mmcintyre@plaind.com, 216-999-4538