SAN JOSE, Calif. (KRON) — The Little Saigon community in San Jose is rallying to address safety concerns following a violent smash-and-grab robbery that left an 88-year-old jewelry store owner with a stroke and a devastated business.
The robbery occurred over the weekend, resulting in tens of thousands of dollars in losses for the elderly store owner, who was knocked over during the incident and subsequently suffered a stroke. The attack has sparked outrage among local leaders and residents, who are calling for increased safety measures in the area.
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San Jose City Councilmember Bien Doan expressed his dismay at the violence, particularly as it affects the large Vietnamese community in the city.
“Think of the traumatization the whole family is going to have for years to come,” he said. “The most important thing in life is safety, and that’s one of the pillars of life, and if we can’t do that we fail.”
“Illegal dumping, graffiti, harassment, a lot of Asian hate that we’ve seen, a lot of immigrant hate,” added Edward Escobar, founder of the Coalition for Community Engagement.
Despite San Jose being ranked as the safest big city in the country, and the police solving every homicide in the last three and a half years, local leaders are concerned about the safety of small businesses, particularly those owned by immigrants.
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Escobar emphasized the need for more safety protections, warning that once a business is attacked, it often does not recover. “When the business is killed off, it does not come back. Any many of these folks, one attack is enough to do the job and they are done,” he said.
In response to the incident, Councilmember Doan is advocating for increased police presence and resources. “I’m pushing our police chief to make sure that we have more police officers, more enforcement and I’m asking our governor to give us funding for more cameras, police officers and to also hire more DA’s and prosecutors. That way we can put a stop to this,” he stated.
All facts in this report were gathered by journalists employed by KRON4. Artificial intelligence tools were used to reformat from a broadcast script into a news article for our website. This report was edited and fact-checked by KRON4 staff before being published.
Stephanie Rothman and Jack Molmud
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