NORTH FULTON COUNTY, Ga. — Flames destroyed most of a Sandy Springs apartment building in December, but police say that was the only beginning of the headache for tenants.
After the smoke settled, police said, looters ransacked the building.
That fire happened at the Pointe at Canyon Ridge Apartments on Roswell Road.
A few days before Thanksgiving, when tenants came back to salvage their belongings, some found them gone.
"My wife and I were in bed and I heard a resident scream right outside our window," Javan Smith said.
"It's one of those things you never think will happen to you. You see it on the news; you hear about it, but it sort of was all a blur," he said.
Smith said his apartment suffered severe water damage. He sent Channel 2's Mike Petchenik pictures of what his unit looked like on the inside.
"We were able to salvage a few sentimental items, but all the furniture was gone," Smith said.
Still, some items survived, and when Smith and his wife went back to retrieve them a week later, he said they got an unpleasant surprise.
"When we walked back in the apartment, we found out that looters had gone through the apartment and gone through every unit. We talked with our neighbors as well," Smith said. "They took some jewelry. They took both of our laptops. We had some neighbors that had televisions stolen."
Smith said the looters added insult to injury.
"The disaster was what it was, but when people rummage through your things and (are) throwing it all over the floor, you do feel a bit violated," Smith said.
Police said they have no leads on who did the looting.