The car burglar steals a bag out of the window he broke
Reader Brian sent us these photos of a car thief stealing bags from an SUV parked on Geary near 28th Avenue on Tuesday night.
The burglary took place in two parts – first breaking the window at 7:15pm and then leaving the scene. And then once confirming all was clear after police came by, the thieves returned around 8:30pm to take the loot. Even a nosy neighbor with a camera didn’t deter them.
Brian described the scene:
“We watched some guys break into a car yesterday outside our window. Called the cops after they broke the window, then they drove around a bit. Cops got there, took the info. Guys came back… First time I scared onhealthy diovan online them off again, then the second time I took pictures and tried to scare them off again. Unfortunately they got one of the guy’s bags.”
San Franciscans know not to leave ANYTHING in plain view inside their car, right?! Hopefully rental car companies give the same warning to their customers.
Brian says he saw the band of thieves hanging around the neighborhood the day before, casing the area.
“They had been wandering around the neighborhood earlier yesterday, around 2PM, mostly hanging out across the street from Grocery Outlet. I’m sure they probably broke into several cars yesterday.”
If you have any information on who this saggy pants robber is, contact the SFPD at (415) 553-0123 (anonymous tips are ok too).
Sarah B.
Thank you Brian for trying to do the neighborly thing. We had someone break into our garage and then car windows not long ago, but this savvy RichmondSFblog reader never leaves anything in her car (garage or no!) and the thief must have been disappointed with the 0.47 cents bounty from the cup holder. Either way… a MARLINS fan!? Hopefully will make him easier to spot around this solidly orange and black neighborhood 🙂
Good surveillance. Would have been good to get the license plate of the get away car. assuming thats it sitting there behind.
Wanted to add, asking if you had a good description of the car. Thankx.
@Leo – Brian said this about the thieves’ cars: “Dark Green 2003-2007 style Honda Accord, possibly with a late 90s style White Firebird/Camaro”
Can’t believe these things are happening right in front of our eyes and in our neighborhood at 7pm in the evening! Cops just come and go and do nothing about it? This is just unacceptable.
@ Carrie Hi, curious how they broke into your garage? Brute force? Some other method?
Should the cops have done more to secure the vehicle contents if they came across a vehicle where a break-in had occurred? If they found a broken window to a business are they obligated to “protect” it until an owner/manager shows up? If it was a rental vehicle I’m sure Hertz etc wouldn’t really care about the renter’s contents if the police contacted the vehicle owner. If the cops had removed the contents to the local police station (and left a note) would they have needed a search warrant to do that? Who’s our SFPD expert?
@Richmond Resident
They actually tried pretty hard to contact the owner. The car was a rental, however, so they were unable contact the renter right away, and their two options were to just leave it, or to sit around and wait for the car renter. They’re pretty busy, so waiting around isn’t much of an option. Eventually the car renter was contacted and showed up later that night.
Admittedly, I maybe pre-emptively finished breaking in and grabbed the stuff after the back window was half-shattered, and left a note. I didn’t think about that too much at the time, because I was thinking the renter would probably show up soon.
Wow! That’s awesome Brian. I’m blind as a bat and can still kind of make out the face. My car has been broken into but only when I’m dumb enough to leave something in plane site, like an ashtray full on car wash tokens. The police do their best. I do wish we had more cops on bikes at night or in general. Or on Vespas. The way they cruise at 5 mph up and down the street with their lights going just screams “we’re coming…pull your pants up and get the *&$% out of here.”
If we had city-sponsored surveillance cameras up on poles we would have the license number of the car(s) used by the thieving vermin in these photos.
Brian, thanks for posting these photos. I live on 28th Avenue just a few blocks down from where this happened. Recently, my downstairs neighbor’s garage had been broken into. As I work late nights (until midnight), I’m back in the neighborhood around 1 AM. I’ve noticed some really sketchy characters walking around and looking into cars. Fortunately, I have my Louisville Slugger as a back up if things get hairy. Anyways, I’ll be on the look out for this guy and any other activity. Great post!
Everyone should join nextdoor.com – awesome tool for us neighbors to make our neighborhood even better.
Thank you, will keep a look out when i’m driving int he neighborhood.
Thanks a lot for the photos/recap. I had something similar happen to me. I came back to my BMW, saw that one of my windows had been shattered. I figured it was just an act of vandalism, so I got in my car and drove away. I know now that the shattering was just Step 1 in the process of the auto-burglary.
These two examples also show how this 2-Step Process makes sense from a criminal point of view. If someone is caught shattering a window, they’ll only be charged with vandalism. If someone is caught taking items out of the car’s window, they can claim that it was only a crime of opportunity and that they’re not career auto-burglars.
Hopefully, the Richmond Police will figure out how to combat this Burglary Two-Step. Maybe with a stakeout..
Is there any description of the suspects? Ethnicity? How many were there? That “M” cap and that “underwear” are good ID points.
I just got the Richmond Station Newsletter and did not see it in the “noteworthy incidents” section since police came and unless the suspect)s) was caught, then it will be in the “noteworthy arrests”.
Question I have is: WHY Not???
get a super soaker with super fluorescent orange paint and tag these guys so the cops can find them later on.
Have https://www.richmondsfblog.com create “10 Most Wanted” burglar’s mugshot posted online so every Richmond District residents can take a look into this !! That would be very helpful to every community.
Disturbing! This robber is quite brazen to do this while someone even took his picture! Any chance this was also recorded on video? Besides removing everything from view in the car interior and not parking on the streets of San Francisco, what else can concerned neighbors do to protect themselves?