Tourist rammed by burglars at Legion of Honor seriously injured, police search for suspects

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- San Francisco Police are looking for the car burglary suspects accused of ramming a tourist in front of his son near the Legion of Honor.

"It's a risk parking here definitely," said William Hamilton, a local artist who came to the museum to see the Reuben paintings.

Visitors to the Legion of Honor were shocked at the news.

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"That makes me sick. That's really hard to hear," said Sarah Hanns, a tourist from Portland.

A tourist was run down by burglars in their vehicle Tuesday in the late afternoon. It happened when he began snapping pictures of them as they broke into his parked rental car.

"In doing so, he was interrupted by the suspect vehicle which struck and ran into the victim," said San Francisco police spokesman Rob Rueca.

The victim is reportedly from Oregon. He is a father in his 40's visiting with his teenaged son.

The man was rushed to Zuckerberg San Francisco General with life-threatening injuries.

"There's so much history here and it's just so beautiful, said Hanns.

Wednesday was another normal day at the Legion of Honor. The parking lot littered with shattered glass. We counted glass in more than a dozen spaces.

Lola Wood thought she was lucky finding a parking place until she looked down.

"This is probably why this parking spot is open. They saw the glass on the ground." Then she realized something. "There's not even any police around."

William Hamilton had a suggestion.

"I'd like to see this organization put some cameras in those trees over there."

The Museum does have cameras on the rooftops. We don't know if they captured what happened. There are signs on lamp posts around the parking lot, but they're small and easy to miss.

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As for police presence-- we saw officers park an empty police van here as a possible deterrent.

"The city was a whole has seen a dip in the auto burglaries. We have been conducting operations throughout the City," said Rueca.

They say the Legion of Honor is one place but admit there have been problems here as well.

"The police department is understaffed," Mayor London Breed told us.

She wants more officers on the beat.

"This is why I continue to push for more Academy classes. Because we do need a police presence in areas where we know there are large groups of people."

Police tell us investigators are looking at surveillance video as well as the images that the tourist took on his cell phone camera which hopefully shows the car the suspects were driving as well as their faces.