Who has it out for Adobe Books? S.F. shop hit by paint vandal for 3rd time in 6 days.

Adobe Books on 24th Street was vandalized for the third time in the last six days this morning. 

On Sunday, Oct. 25, the bookstore at 3130 24th St. was hit for the first time. A worker arrived to open the store to find that Adobe’s security gate, front door and windows were heavily splattered with white paint. 

The following day, on Monday, workers found the store had been hit a second time — this time with pink paint. 

By Friday morning, it was struck again. The storefront was splattered with red paint. 

Now, if you weren’t looking for Adobe, you might miss it altogether. The 24th Street storefront, normally adorned with carts filled with books, and an a-frame sign advertising the store’s events, is bare. Its workers — all volunteers, who run the legacy business as a co-op — fear those too will get vandalized.

The storefront windows, which are now caked with three layers of paint, are impossible to see through. The sidewalk, covered in giant gloops of paint that dripped off of the glass, looks like it could be an abstract painting. 

At this point, Jon Fellman, one of the store’s volunteers, says he doesn’t know if he should bother with trying to scrape it off. “I did a little bit,” Fellman said. “But if it’s gonna happen again tomorrow — I don’t want to have to scrape it again.”

So far, Fellman said, Adobe’s volunteers do not know why they’re being targeted. But they do have their suspicions. 

“We do have radical events here,” Fellman said, “and so we have a feeling it’s politically motivated.” 

Adobe does not have surveillance cameras outside the store, Fellman said. Footage from a neighbor’s camera, however, shows that the Friday attack happened around 12:45 a.m. 

Seeing that the attacks have not let up, Fellman said, the co-op is filing a police report. 

“We’re mad and sad,” said Fellman. “It’s upsetting and people don’t feel safe.” 

This isn’t the first time Adobe Books has been the target of malicious intent. 

Fellman says two years ago the bookstore received an email saying a bomb had been planted in the store. However, police and a bomb-sniffing dog proved the threat to be false.