A loaf of bread, a quart of milk, and now ATMs are being stolen from corner stores and other establishments.
Thieves have yanked out, or at least attempted to yank out, 16 ATMs across San Francisco this year — eight of those in the Mission District.
“ATM crime is getting out of control,” contends David Tente, the executive director of the ATM Industry Association’s North America branch.
Police crime data shows just 10 ATM thefts in San Francisco this year, with two of them in the Mission. But business owners confirmed at least six incidents in the Mission over the past three months — five more than the SFPD’s tally.
Mission businesses, including Randa’s Market, Jumpstart Coffee & Grocery, Clooney’s Pub, Walgreens, R Image Market and K&H Liquors have all suffered from ATM thefts since mid September. Only one was lucky enough to see their ATM remain intact — because the owners chained it to a wall and a witness called the police. On Friday morning, thieves smashed a truck into a CVS store in the Outer Richmond and fled with an ATM in another vehicle.
“They’re being bold, because they are allowed to be bold,” said Feda Zeidan, co-owner of Randa’s Market at 3131 16th St. The store was broken into on Sept. 17 around 4 a.m., her husband, Mike, said.
Four thieves busted the front gate padlock with a crowbar and broke in. Two tackled the ATM machine, while the others scoured the store for valuables.
The owners alleged that the suspects’ car, a black Lexus sedan, was parked in front of the store, and the suspects traveled back and forth to their vehicle to grab more tools for the operation.
“We got lucky,” Zeidan said. Before the suspects could take the ATM, police arrived and the suspects fled the scene. Zeidan said police told them, “We have orders not to chase them.”
Others were not so lucky. Jumpstart Coffee & Grocery at Guererro and 24th streets was broken into around 4 a.m. on Oct. 10. Four suspects fled with the ATM, which was also attached to the floor. The thieves also took the store’s pricing gun and all the cigarettes in stock, store owner Peter Baqain said.
For a small business like a corner store, ATMs — specifically, the surcharges users pay — serve as an extra revenue stream, said Tente from the ATM Industry Association.
The money in each machine varies, but it’s not uncommon to have $50,000 to $100,000 in an ATM, if the location is popular and has a lot of cash users, Tente said. For smaller stores, the amount is lower. The ATM in Jumpstart Coffee & Grocery, for instance, contained some $5,000 at most, the owner said.
When machines get stolen, the loss is usually on the ATM companies, rather than the store owner, Tente added. But not so for the damage to the store and any repair costs. The Zeidans, for example, spent about $10,000 to fix their broken gate.
And this is not just happening in San Francisco.
It has gotten bad enough that this May, a new federal bill — the Safe Access to Cash Act — was introduced in the House of Representatives to combat ATM crimes, including theft, robbery and assault. The penalties could include higher fines and up to 20 years in prison.
Right now, security measures taken by business owners are mostly “common sense” actions, Tente said. These include hiring a security guard, bolting an ATM to the floor, or simply moving the machine from the front to the back of the store.
And that’s indeed what Mission businesses are doing. After an ATM theft about five months ago, Muddy Waters Coffee House moved its machine away from the front. Randa’s Market's owners now lock the storefront with four locks, and chain up everything they can.
“We can just make it more difficult for them, that’s all we can do,” said Mike Zeidan.
Jumpstart’s Baqain said he’s not going to replace his purloined ATM. When customers ask about getting cash back, he points them to nearby banks instead.
“They see how easy it is to get the first time; why not come back the second time, the third time, and the fourth time?” he said of the thieves. “It’s definitely not worth the risk anymore.”
Kelly Waldron contributed to this reporting.
Thieves seem emboldened by police “orders not to chase”.
Clearly. But there is a distinction between “let them get away” and “do not chase”. In a previous case (I think the Clooney’s incident), the thieves even ran into the police car! How and why do our police continue to let these criminals slip through their fingers?
unabated unpunished neighborhood criminality harms elders, low income, disabled, migrants, vehicle-less and all of the “most vulnerable communities” in the neighborhood much more that it harms the more affluent, who have the where-with-all to create options. if being “soft on crime” is supposed to have some sort of anti-capitalist motives, or be a strategy to create “restorative justice” that “empowers the most vulnerable”… its efficacy as well as its core logic are highly questionable. across the nation its well documented outcome is directly converse to attaining those goals.
No repurcussions for commiting crime = more crime is coming
They needed money to buy holiday gifts at the BART stolen goods flea market.
Great opportunity for a kid to earn a few bucks in the Mission. For 5 bucks, they could stand at the ATM with a lead pipe and smack the crap out of anyone that tried to rob the person making a withdrawal. Heck, I might do that…
Good thing the Board of Supervisors passed a law requiring every business in the city to accept cash so that criminals and continue siphoning their take from hardworking, lawful residents.
Well, since the Mission is the epicenter of the “soft on crime” voting mentality, I have little sympathy.