Couple Caught On CCTV Breaking Locked Door To S’pore Bar, Smiled & Waved At Camera

Picture this: a bar, with its lights off, door shut, a blind lowered over the entrance. Most people who pass by this sight would assume that the bar is closed, right?

Apparently not, as a couple was recently caught on closed-circuit television at local bar Side Door, trying to get into its premises despite the bar being closed. In the process, they also broke the door lock and left, smiling and waving at the CCTV camera.

In an attempt to track down the mischief makers, the bar uploaded the camera footage to its Instagram Stories, where it quickly took off.

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What happened?

According to Tryson, the incident happened on Dec 12, a Thursday night. While Side Door is typically open on Thursdays, it was closed on that day as Tryson and Bannie were away in Korea for a work event.

In the CCTV footage shared with 8days.sg, a woman dressed in black was seen walking up to the bar’s entrance and lifting up the blind covering the door. She walked back to her male companion, who then went up to do the same.

He also slid himself in between the blind and door and jiggled the door handle, while the woman peered over his shoulder into the bar. “We put a blind so no one could reach the glass door, but [the couple] went in from the side to jiggle the door handle with pressure,” Tryson pointed out.

Smiled and waved at camera

Footage from another CCTV camera inside the bar showed the man pulling at the door lock handle before the glass door suddenly opened. He tried to close the door before walking away.

Tryson explained: “The door opened up, so [the man] realised he had a problem and he closed the door back. But the door handle was broken and the door was left open for 15 hours. Everything was caught on camera.” He has since made a police report.

In the CCTV footage, another man — whose identity Tryson never found out — was standing outside the bar observing the couple. He then walked up and addressed them, and also peeked behind the blind himself before checking his watch and gesticulating at the couple. Meanwhile, the couple started checking their phones, seemingly looking up information about the bar’s opening hours.

A while later, they walked away from Side Door. The woman looked up at the CCTV camera and smiled and waved. She also gave a cutesy shrug before she left.

Couple apparently “medical professionals with two kids”

After they appeared on Side Door’s Instagram Stories, Instagrammers who knew the couple DMed the bar. Tryson shared: “We had common friends who shared their information with us. [The couple] are actually medical professionals who work together, and they have two kids.” He added that the couple looked to be in their early to mid-thirties.

According to Tryson, it was the couple who reached out to the bar after seeing themselves on Instagram. “I told them they should have contacted us on the same day. They chose to wave to the CCTV and let me find them. They only admitted to what they did because we tagged [several media outlets]. They DMed us, called our outlet and was super rude to our staff, and DMed one of our staff on Instagram. It took them 48 hours to let me know who they were, and we had a second Instagram Story that was still running when they contacted us,” he said.

Spent $300 to repair lock

Although his bar’s door was left unlocked and open for almost a day, Tryson said nothing was stolen from his bar. “It’s Singapore and it’s safe, but we shouldn’t take it for granted. The issue is also about safety,” he pointed out.

He had to spend $300 engaging a locksmith to repair his broken door lock and handle. “If the door is not fixed, I cannot operate. That day we had to open at 8pm instead of 3pm. We had to repair our door and go through all this for nothing,” Tryson said.

He added: “I asked the couple if they knew it was a crime [to trespass], but the lady said it’s not a crime ’cos the police are still investigating. She felt it was our fault for not putting up a sign that we were closed on that day. Two days ago, she also deleted all her messages to me and deleted her Instagram account, but I already have screenshots.”