Boot camp graduate's Dress Blues stolen by smash and grab thieves

ATLANTA - A celebratory lunch for a Fort Benning boot camp graduate turned sour with the discovery that bold thieves struck while his family ate feet away inside a Candler Park restaurant.

Thieves broke into his car, took his dress blues and his travel documents, medical information and all the information he needed to get to his next duty station.

While replacing the paperwork was easy, getting the uniform assigned to Private Christian Garcia by the army was going to be costly.

"I was upset about it and made a post on Facebook about it," says Fox Bros Bar-B-Q General Manager Keith Kendrick.

The outrage came quickly, and so did the offers to help. From strangers.
But as the money came together, a discovery by another stranger in the bushes near the Dekalb Avenue restaurant - the stolen backpack and dress blues.  Along with the emergency contact information the man used to contact Private Garcia's mother in Miami.

"Thank you so much. Everyone was so helpful. I'm still in shock I managed to recover all my stuff," the boot camp grad told us by phone.  He heads to Alaska in the coming days for his first assignment.