Police are searching for a burglar, after someone broke into Dutchman Hunting Supplies in Shipshewana early on Friday morning.

The LaGrange County Sheriff’s Department is working with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms to offer a $10,000 cash reward for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of a suspect or suspects.

While officers would not say how many firearms were taken, one of the owners of the store say 14 handguns were taken.

Dutchman Hunting Supplies is located at 8400-block of W. U.S. 20 in Shipshewana. Being a small town hunting supply store, they typically know all of their customers.

"You always kind of considered it to be a local town," Daryl Bontrager, one of the owner's of the store said. "Everybody knows everybody. But it can happen anywhere I guess."

Bontrager, who did not want to be filmed because of his Amish Heritage, says after Friday's break in, he's questioning everything.

"It definitely changes things," Bontrager said. "It makes you wonder who it was. If it was one of the regular customers, it would be nice to kind of know who it was. We definitely got scoped. They knew exactly where they were going."

Bontrager has a theory about whoever broke in. He says the person, or people, broke the glass in the back door and rather than reaching in to unlock the door, the suspect(s) climbed through the window as to not set off the alarm. However, the store had a motion detector which picked up the activity but not before they could make off with the guns.

"From the time they were in here and the first alarm sounded and the time that they left, I think in between there is like less than three minutes total they were in the building," Bontrager said. "So they definitely knew they had a small time frame and they knew what they wanted and they came and got it and left. It makes you wonder who it was. We pretty much trusted everybody that came in here or most all the people you did. You had a pretty good relationship with the customers you had and it would be nice to kind of know who it was."

The store has surveillance cameras but Bontrager says a power surge within the last couple months ruined them so they were not active during the time of the burglary.

Bontrager says he was given a DNA swab to make sure he wasn't a suspect. He says the culprit(s) likely barely got out in time.

"I think they just kind of pretty much came in, busted the glass in, scooped up what they could and left."

Bontrager says of the 14 guns stolen, they were semi-automatic handguns. None of the longer guns were take, nor were the revolvers. He suspects the semi-automatic guns have a higher street value.

"Even if it's just one gun, we're concerned," Sheriff Jeff Campos with LaGrange County said. "Taken illegally, we don't know what type of person has that firearm."

The Sheriff says they are investigating a string of break-ins in LaGrange County over the last couple months but wouldn't say whether they are connected. They do say this is the first burglary that resulted in the theft of firearms.

They ask that you contact them by phone at 260-463-7491 or private message on Facebook. You can also contact Crime Stoppers at 574-288-STOP or 800-342-STOP.