The owner of a trendy restaurant in crime-ridden Oakland, California, says his eatery was robbed on Wednesday for the seventh time in just four years.
Surveillance footage of Kitchen Story on College Avenue obtained by ABC 7 shows an unknown burglar who is already in the restaurant on Wednesday morning, walking past the tables and heading to a door at the back.
The suspect, wearing a dark hoodie and pants with a light on his head, was then seen trying to pry open the door.
When that ultimately failed, he fled, the local news channel reported.
But restaurant owner Chaiporn Kitsadaviseksak says the door the man tried to open leads to an office, where he keeps cash and iPads.
A would-be robber was caught on surveillance video trying to pry open a Kitchen Story office door in Oakland, California, on Wednesday morning.
Kitsadaviseksak stated that although the suspect walked away without stealing anything, he did break down the front door.
There were shards of glass visible around the frame and the owner says it costs him thousands of dollars each time he has to repair the door.
He is now calling on the police to patrol the area.
“You know, I’m really fed up because when I call the police, no one can help me,” Kitsadaviseksak said.
‘… I can report it to the police, I don’t have a chance to do that. They just say, you know, I can do it [it] online. What’s the use?’
DailyMail.com has contacted Oakland police about the matter.
The owner of the trendy restaurant says the incident is the seventh robbery in just four years
Although the suspect walked away without stealing anything, he left the front door smashed, with glass scattered across the frame
But police in the Democratic-run city have previously admitted that only 35 officers patrol the city at any given time.
Oakland is a city of about 435,000 people, which means that at any given time there is only one officer on patrol for every 12,500 residents.
The department has 705 officers, but the city has authorized only 678. Miami, a comparable city, has more than 1,100 sworn members of its police force, and Long Beach, California, has 824 officers.
In addition, the Oakland Police Department’s records department uses outdated software and a reporting management system that has not been updated since 2006, resulting in woefully inaccurate crime statistics.
What has been reported does suggest that the city is facing a wave of crime.
Robberies involving an unknown dangerous weapon increased by 23 percent compared to last year. as shown by the latest crime figures.
The number of home robberies has also almost doubled: from 24 in the same period last year to 46 in 2024. The number of burglaries at ‘unknown’ locations has increased by 152 percent.
Earlier this month, a female rapper and entrepreneur known as Tan DaGod was tragically murdered during the grand opening of her new beauty supply store.
According to Oakland police, someone else was also shot but survived.
Oakland-based rapper Tan DaGod (pictured) was fatally shot while opening a new beauty store in the California city
One person was seen crying on the ground as a friend comforted him, next to several red roses left by relatives after the Oakland shooting.
Residents say the city has always been plagued by crime, but since the pandemic, reports have risen sharply and are only now starting to decline.
However, a study by the Koreatown Northgate Community Benefit District found that 94 percent of businesses were robbed, and 92 percent went unreported.
In one case, dozens of thieves were caught on camera looting a gas station for $22,000 worth of goods after crashing his car through the glass doors.
It took nine hours for the police to arrive at the scene.
This, according to some prominent Oakland residents, is the central problem: The police can’t keep up, and both victims and criminals know it.
A February report from the Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice found that only 1.5 percent of serious crimes were solved, including just 6.5 percent of violent crimes.
While the rest of California is spending record amounts on law enforcement and sending more suspected criminals to prison than ever before.
About 100 robbers looted a gas station in Oakland, California, in the middle of the night
Former police chief LeRonne Armstrong, who was fired by Mayor Sheng Thao last year, blames City Hall for the downward spiral, saying authorities deliberately siphoned money away from the police.
Last year, Thao imposed a freeze on police hiring, despite the fact that there were and still are shortages. Critics like Armstrong say the council is deliberately shrinking the role of police officers without enough replacements.
“There’s a sense of lawlessness. A sense of, we can do whatever we want, there’s really no consequences – almost like a video game,” he said The free press.
“Our leaders are deaf to the tone.”
Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao will face a historic recall election in November amid anger over her failure to get the situation under control
Armstrong claimed the problem was so obvious that lawbreakers were coming to the city for “crime tourism.”
Armstrong told me that Oakland’s free trade zone is now attracting criminals from out of town because they know they can get away with it, the newspaper reported.
Tim Gardner of the Oakland Report had a similar view: “You have a police force that is incapable and a criminal group that is smart enough to recognize that, test it, and realize they can do anything they want.
“It’s 100 percent our own fault.”
Thao will now facing historic recall elections in November, while she is angry over her inability to get the situation under control.
The progressive Democratic lawmaker is the first mayor in the city’s history to face impeachment after a campaign to oust her garnered more than 40,000 signatures.
Critics are angry that she missed the opportunity to apply for a $15 million grant for shoplifting, fired Chief Armstrong “without cause” without naming a successor and lost the Oakland A’s baseball team.
The progressive district attorney for Alameda County, which includes Oakland, also faces a recall vote
Thao’s opponents blame her progressive policies for the skyrocketing crime rate.
One of those proposals was a bizarre one: life coaching could help tackle murder and other crimes.
The plan was proposed as part of the city’s ceasefire plan, which had been on the back burner until Thao took office.
The progressive district attorney of Alameda County, which includes Oakland, is also facing recall in November.
District Attorney Pamela Price is accused of pursuing policies that encourage criminals and put their interests above those of victims.