Anyone Else Confused About the Bizarre Destruction of Flower Pots in Portland, Maine?

There's a cool way to be mysterious, and then there's just a really crappy way of being mysterious. The Valentine's Day heart bandit is a perfect example of what being a good mysterious bandit looks like. While we'd sleep, he'd be awake dressing the town with paper hearts so we'd wake up feeling loved. However, in this case, this mysterious flower bandit is not the good kind.

Here's what's going on, at least from what I'm witnessing. Since I get up around 4 a.m. every day, I walk into work near Monument Square in Portland, Maine, at around 5 a.m. Most of the little shops and storefronts that line the square have little flower pots that keep the aesthetic looking clean and welcoming to the public. I always adore them. The last few days that I've walked into work, the soil from the pots has been dug up, and the flowers have been laying unplanted on the ground. Yesterday, I took a long look around, and it seemed that whoever was destroying the flower pots had hit every store on the entire street.

What is the purpose of this? The flowers seem to be picked at and then thrown away on the ground. The soil is scattered all over walkways and streets, which honestly made it look like it was some kind of malicious act. Whoever is doing this doesn't seem to care about hiding the evidence of their destruction.

When I spoke with some neighboring businesses, they told me that this isn't the first time this flower bandit has struck overnight. It's truly disheartening and a bit concerning. Have you witnesses this human at all in any capacity?