Another San Francisco neighborhood, sick and tired of rising crime, is taking matters into their own hands -- banding together to hire its own security force.
Pictures all over social media depict crimes in the city, even in broad daylight. Cars burglarized, sometimes with people inside, sometimes the same car more than once.
On Russian Hill Tuesday, tired of being victims, people met to consider the cost for some peace of mind.
Someone at the meeting said people know they can come to San Francisco to steal and assault with no consequences.
Alan Kutzenko has lived on Russian Hill for 16 years and knows about crime up there.
“Lots of broken glass. Cars are just constantly broken into,” he said. “There have been a number of package robberies. It’s actually rampant ... I have a few women friends and they are very uncomfortable and nervous at night.”
Not far away in the Marina District, neighbors have already hired a security force. Supervisor Catherine Stefani represents that area, and recently spoke with NBC Bay Area’s Investigative Reporter Bigad Shiban about crime and punishment, or lack thereof.
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“I've been in this city for 21 years,” she said. “I've been in public service since 2007. I've never heard the complaints about home break-ins and other property crime like I have in the past year and a half.”
And like the folks on Russian Hill, Stefani sees a lack of prosecution as a major part of the problem.
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“If you know your sentence is going to be less here or you might not be charged, what’s to stop you?” Stefani said. “It’s the whole ball of wax: the mayor, the Board of Supervisors, prosecutors, the police. They blame each other but They can’t sit down and have a system that works.”
NBC Bay Area reached out to the District Attorney's Office for comment after hours but did not receive a response.
