San Francisco start-up hopes to catch thief burglarizing them

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- One San Francisco start-up is trying to catch a thief who has stolen thousands of dollars of computer equipment. The company BuildZoom provided pictures of the woman who may be behind a series of break-ins.

BuildZoom showed ABC7 News video where you can see a female burglar calmly walk into the office after hours. She gives the space a quick look just to make sure no one is around and then she snags a bag from under a desk and starts digging through the office for stuff to snatch.

BuildZoom co-founder Steve Peterson said, "They wanted all Apple stuff. They left PC desktops everywhere and laptops. If there was like a little Apple devise, they grabbed it."

Peterson says their office building has been broken into three times in the last several weeks.

He said, "It felt like an inside job, where she had the key and they've been back and the first time they knew the alarm code."

On the third building break-in, the upstairs neighbors -- a company called Fetch -- had seven laptops stolen. Peterson decided to install a surveillance camera and that is when they caught the prowler on video.

After picking through the place for a few minutes, an alarm goes off and the startled burglar quickly leaves.

ABC7 News checked with San Francisco police and they didn't offer specifics on the break-in at BuildZoom. They also didn't say there was a targeting of tech firms in the city. However, they did note a recent increase in commercial burglaries.

Earlier this week, another start-up called Demand Local was also broken into on Beldon Place in the Financial District. It's not clear if the same person is responsible for all these incidents, but Peterson is hoping to catch the burglar who came into his office. He's posted the video on YouTube.

He said, "I just thought it might be in the community. One of my followers might have an idea who this person was."

He's offering $1,000 to anyone who can identify her.