String of Oakland Lakeshore Avenue break-ins include kosher butcher, Chinese restaurant

OAKLAND, Calif. - Employees at Oakland Kosher Foods on Lakeshore Avenue walked into work on Wednesday morning to find the door busted, their shop ransacked and two cash registers full of money yanked away from the front counter.

Owner Gali Atias said he normally has surveillance video inside the shop, but the thieves had disabled the sensors so none of the crime was captured on camera. 

Atias said that he wasn't the only one burglarized. 

MORE: Oakland artist, formerly homeless, uses his experience 'to capture the true emotions of life

Abba's Hummus, which is part of the butcher shop, and Lin Jia Asian Kitchen along the densely populated retail corridor near Lake Merritt, were also hit.

Atias was upset as he was also short-staffed on Wednesday but said he planned to file a police and insurance reports to recover his losses.

Another owner, Gary Freeman said, "It's just aggravation. They need the money. They'll do anything to get the money. I don't understand it. It's sad."

Marcia Lam, owner of Lin Jia Asian Kitchen, said thieves also broke in through the front door and went straight for the cash registers. But they left empty-handed. 

"They didn't take anything," Lam said. "They pulled on the registers, but the registers are open. There's nothing there. We don't put anything there."

Still, Lam said the break-in has dampened spirits. 

"It's kind of depressing," she said. "I mean, we're trying to survive this inflation, this COVID, but then you come down here and you deal with this in the morning, it's just hard." 

Oakland police said they were called out at 7:15 a.m. Wednesday to investigate but they did not detail the scope of the break-ins.