Dec. 9—A convenience store in Joplin was broken into for a fourth and fifth time in three weeks early Wednesday morning.

Police say another business nearby also was broken into during the night but that they were able to arrest a suspect in one of the three Wednesday burglaries.

Capt. Williams Davis said three burglars who broke into the Zips In and Out store at 1201 S. Range Line Road about 2 a.m. stuffed a backpack full of merchandise and got away before officers arrived in response to an alarm.

About half an hour later, the store was entered for a second time, and about $80 worth of cigarettes were taken. The two burglaries were the fourth and fifth time the store was hit by burglars in the past three weeks.

Davis said that police received a call about 3 a.m. from an employee of a store open for business at the time in the 1500 block of South Range Line Road concerning a man in the store bragging about having broken into another business.

Officers responding to the call contacted Corbin M. Gunter, 26, of Nevada, Missouri, at the open business and eventually arrested him. He was charged with having committed the second burglary of the night at the Zips In and Out store.

A business alarm at Vapor Maven, 1006 S. Range Line Road, was triggered at 4:24 a.m. when someone broke a window there to commit a third burglary in the area within two and a half hours.

Davis said merchandise appeared to have been disturbed inside Vapor Maven and that there was evidence that someone tried to get into a cash register. But it was not yet known Thursday what, if anything, had been stolen.

The Zips store was broken into Monday of this week and Nov. 21 and Nov. 24. Juveniles are suspected in those burglaries as well as the first one Wednesday morning.