LAS VEGAS — Take a good look at the man in this surveillance picture. To Danny Ballard, he’s the villain in a comic book caper that began around 10 a.m. Thursday.
“I would rather them have stole my car,” said Ballard.
Ballard relates more to superheroes; the ones in comics and the ones he works with at Critical Care Comics which delivers comic books to hospitalized children. When he found out his personal collection was stolen from inside a locked storage unit, the news brought him to tears.
"I felt like such a dork,” Ballard said. “You know, because I'm a grown man crying over comics."
Ballard called police. They pored over surveillance video which includes one good close up of a possible suspect and a blurry shot of the license plate on what they believe to be the getaway car. Ballard said it appears the thieves were able to figure out the gate and storage door access codes and then sawed their way through the door.
“When they broke in they went straight to my unit. They only broke into my unit. And they only took the comics," he said.
There were 12 boxes of comics in all.
"One comic in there alone is worth five thousand dollars! Just one book," Ballard said.
It was a collection it has taken him a lifetime to build.
"I'm a big Spider-Man and Batman fan. I also had the entire run of Big Trouble in Little China,” he said. “The sillier shorter run titles."
He had hoped to pass the collection on to his son. Now he just hopes someone will see the surveillance picture and lead police to the crook and his prized possessions.
