First the smash-and-grabbers came for our outerwear. Then it was our gold. And now, in San Francisco's latest thieves-drive-into-a-business-and-steal-their-stuff heist, it's a West Portal audio/video store that's left picking up the pieces.
Harmony Audio Video's been "meeting the needs of the discriminating music and film enthusiast" for over 30 years, they say on their website. We're not talking that crappy little Bluetooth speaker you use to listen to podcasts in the shower, they sell high-end speakers, amps, and the like, items in the thousands of dollars, all sold from their location at 333 West Portal Avenue.
Perhaps it was those big ticket items that attracted the attention of thieves, who drove a pick-up truck through the store's front door at around 4 Sunday morning? As CBS5 reports, the impact brought the store's "security gate to its knees," sending Harmony's bulletproof glass flying and snapping their security door in half.
Then the miscreants burst in and stole "anywhere from $25,000 to $40,000 worth of equipment," Harmony owner Frank Mari says, though he noted that the thieves only took half of a stereo system valued at $15,000, leaving behind the other, necessary half.
“They’re only sold as matched pairs," Mari said, so the stolen items "are rather useless as a single item."
This is just the latest smash-and-grab to plague San Francisco venues: a little more than a month ago, thieves crashed into the Fisherman's Wharf Patagonia store, stealing rack upon rack of expensive outerwear.
A week later, three men drove an SUV into the Wells Fargo History Museum, holding a security guard at gunpoint as they stole gold nuggets worth thousands.
At publication time, the suspects in all of these cases remain at large. Regarding Sunday's stereo heist, all witnesses saw was the suspect pickup truck racing toward the West Portal tunnel just moments after the crash.
Previously: U-Haul Used To Smash Into SF Outerwear Store, Swipe Loads Of Goods
Stolen SUV Crashes Into Museum, Masked Gunmen Abscond With Gold