A CHINESE restaurant in Wheelock Street has been broken into for the second time in a few months.

At 1am the morning of Friday, March 10, the Alhambra restaurant was burgled by three people, two confirmed men, with an estimated £220 stolen.

The burglars broke into the restaurant, and whilst one burglar watched outside, the two men stole the contents of the till and bottles of alcohol before escaping without being seen.

The Alhambra was previously burgled in a similar fashion on January 16, but it is unknown whether these two crimes are connected.

The owner of the restaurant, Alan Lee, found out when his mother discovered that the back door had been forced open around 9am the same morning.

Alan said: “They first broke through the door with what looks to be with a type of crowbar, left for 10 minutes and then returned to steal several bottles of spirits and £70 from the till.

“We’ve been here for 20 years and this hasn’t happened once, yet now we’ve been burgled twice in two months. I don’t understand why.

“We haven’t been able to claim on the insurance both times either, the first because there was no forced entry, and now because the excess is too high.”

It was initially believed that two men were the only ones involved in the crime, but further CCTV footage shows a third person keeping a look out on the outskirts of the premises.

Fingerprints were also discovered at the scene and police are now going through their database see if there is a connection with their leads.

Cheshire Police is calling on anyone with information to contact 101 quoting incident number 178 of March 10 2017.

Alternatively information can be given anonymously by contacting Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.