It started as a quiet morning at Coquitlam Centre.

The sun was still down, and rush hour a couple hours away.

But on Friday, July 6, the still of the morning was shattered by a brazen heist, straight out of a Hollywood script.

It started just before 5 a.m., when a black stolen Ford F-150 pickup truck smashed through the glass entrance of the mall near the Scotiabank.

Four masked gunmen then jumped out, breaking their way into the Ben Moss Jewellers store.

Within a matter of moments, the suspects made off with a bounty in a third vehicle waiting outside, a dark blue Jeep Cherokee.

Coquitlam Mounties got the call of an alarm at the mall, but the suspects had fled by the time police arrived.

No one was injured in the robbery, but the suspects left a trail of destruction behind, including significant damage to a mall entrance and three nearby businesses.

The thieves also left the truck behind.

"We haven't seen something like this recently in the Coquitlam-Port Coquitlam area," noted RCMP Cpl. Jamie Chung.

The incident was caught on surveillance cameras.

Had anyone been in the area of the mall at the time, Chung suggested the results would have been "unimaginable."

There was mall security in the building at the time of the incident.

Eventually, the police did track down all three stolen vehicles involved in the heist, but the suspects remain at large.

The three vehicles were reported stolen from various areas of Vancouver.

Chung, who described the loot taken from the jewelry store as a "significant amount of property," said it appeared the robbery was well planned.

As for the mall, officials told The NOW they plan to review current security measures to see if any changes are needed.

"We definitely will sit down after this and review all that closely and, if any additional measures are necessary, then we'll likely implement those," said Deborah Stetz, the mall's marketing director.

She noted, in all, three businesses were damaged in the heist. One of the businesses is expected to remain closed for a week.

Stetz said she couldn't put a dollar figure on the amount of damage, but suggested it would be in the thousands of dollars.

Coquitlam RCMP is asking anyone with information to call the local detachment at 604-945-1550 and quote file number 2012-18097.

jdeutsch@thenownews.com