‘Crime Wave’: San Francisco bars endure break-ins

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SAN FRANCISCO (KRON) – Mars Bar has been in the SoMa neighborhood for 25 years, but its owner says it’s been a struggle to keep the business afloat, and being targeted by thieves isn’t making it any easier.

“All the bars in San Francisco are barely surviving right now and it just is more insult to injury. Salt on a wound,” said owner David Kiely. ”It’s just been a crime wave of all the bars in San Francisco… they are constantly breaking in.”

Video (included above) shows the quick and brazen burglary at Mars Bar on the early morning of August 23.

“Came in, broke open the front doors. Stole the ATM and two cash registers and they were out the door,” Kiely described. 

Kiely says the registers were empty, and the ATM had very little money in it. But the burglars left costly damage. He says other nearby business owners have also been hit. 

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“Hotel Utah at 4th and Brannan, they hit Oasis, they hit Audio. They tried to hit Powerhouse on Folsom at 4:30 in the morning but neighbors scared them away,” Kiely said. 

A little more than a mile away, thieves also smashed in the glass door to Asiento bar in the Mission District. The burglary happened on Tuesday around 1 a.m. The thieves are seen beelining for the cash registers.  

Owner Debi Cohn says the thieves took off with credit cards left behind by customers, so she posted about it on social media.

“So I put it out there saying ‘If you left your card make sure to block or cancel them. But if someone used your card last night please let me know where because police are actually looking, because they think this is a regular perpetrator,’” Cohn said. 

Cohn says responding officers did obtain fingerprints from the scene. She slept in the bar in the hours after the burglary because the door was broken.

This longtime bar owner is also on the Mission Merchant Association board. She says many people are dealing with crime. 

“It’s rampant. We in the Mission feel like we are not getting our fair share of attention,” she said. 

Kiely says he plans to replace the ATM but empty it every night. Cohn is worried the thieves will be back for her safe, which has no valuables inside. 

Meanwhile, Kiely is trying to draw attention to his burglary by putting information about the crime in the window of his bar. He says this theft only makes it harder to survive when it’s already a struggle to get customers through the door.  

“We are in a ghost town down here,” he said. “Everybody is working from home and that’s what is hurting us because all of our after-work business is gone.”

Kiely says he has pivoted to hosting events, and that’s helped keep him afloat. but city zoning laws are throwing a wrench in that plan.

“We would like to see our zoning change so we can do events later in the night. Right now we can only do events until 10 p.m., and that’s really hurting us,” he said. 

Both business owners are applying for a city grant to help repair their front doors. KRON4 reached out to San Francisco police to get details on each burglary, but we did not hear back in time for this report.

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Sara Stinson

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