Shrimp scam-pi was on the menu.
Thieves swiped a tractor-trailer loaded to the gills with $305,000 in frozen shrimp bound for a Garden State Costco, authorities said.
The sticky-fingered seafood lovers poached the parked tractor-trailer — valued at $50,000 — from private property on Smalley Avenue, police said, in the industrial part of Middlesex, a four-square-mile town.
The shell-shocked owner of the truck, who had been renting a parking spot in the warehouse area on Smalley Avenue, called police shortly after 4 a.m. on Sept. 5 to report the theft, Detective Sgt. Sean Flanagan of the Middlesex Borough Police Department told The Post.
“He contacted us immediately and we began investigating,” Flanagan added.
Police said the cargo “was ready for delivery” to a Costco in Monroe, NJ.
Ubaldo Eras, 42, who ran his El Primo Truck Trailer Repair and Road Service out of the Smalley Avenue location until two months ago, believes the bass-tards targeted his friend.
“I think they followed him,” Eras theorized.
Investigators are now casting a wide net for the krill seekers, interviewing fishmongers and “canvassing the area and obtaining as much video as possible,” Flanagan said.
The prawn brokers also raided four shipping containers in the yard, but nothing was reported missing.
There have been no arrests.
Anyone with information is asked to contact Detective Scott Mulford at (732) 356-1900 ext. 359 or at smulford@middlesexpd.com.
