Thieves in San Francisco have been caught on camera cruising the street in a Lexus before stopping at parked cars to smash the windows in and steal goods inside.

The brazen thefts were seen in footage obtained by local news station KTVU on Thursday afternoon.

Henry Lee, KTVU's crime reporter, filmed the scene in Fisherman's Wharf - the heart of San Francisco's tourist district - in broad daylight, and shared it on Twitter.

One SUV even had a person sitting in the back when the windows were smashed, but the thief still snatched the victim's bag before escaping in the waiting Lexus.

Lt. Tracy McCray told The New York Post the smash-and-grab technique was known in the Bay Area as 'bipping and boosting'.

'It really exploded during the pandemic - so much so that someone told me that the sidewalks are glistening and sparkling [with glass from windows] where cars are broken into left and right,' she said.

San Francisco had nearly 1,670 car break-ins in the past 30 days, according to the latest data tracked by the San Francisco Police Department.

Thieves in San Francisco are seen getting into a white Lexus on Wednesday, having smashed windows in parked cars and stolen goods inside

These guys in Lexus bipped cars all over SF’s Fisherman’s Wharf, one by one. “I started following them, and they just didn’t care, obviously, that they were being followed or not, and it kept happening,” witness tells me. @SFPD @SFPDCentral pic.twitter.com/WzKacoRFGl — Henry K. Lee (@henrykleeKTVU) August 16, 2023

There has been nearly 10,000 thefts from vehicles in the city so far this year.

Signs can be seen throughout the city warning residents and tourists not to leave anything inside their cars, but the crime rate has remained stubbornly high.

Tourist areas such as the North Beach, Japantown and Presidio have the highest rate of break-ins in cars per 10,000 residents.

Last year, McCray, president of the San Francisco Police Officers Federation, fell victim to the crime herself.

Her car was parked on the 1200 block of Franklin Street, in between the Tenderloin and Japantown, on March 23, 2022, while she visited a relative at the CPMC Van Ness Campus hospital.

McCray said she was parked for less than 30 minutes, but still her car was broken into.

She wrote a blog post entitled: 'Hell - they got me, too!'

The white Lexus waits with its door open as the thief gets to work. The thief grabs bags, then runs back to the waiting car

McCray wrote: 'I had officially become a casualty of the auto burglary epidemic!

'Fortunately, nothing was stolen from my vehicle - not even my dog's dirty towel I use to wipe him down after playing at the beach, however it still managed to rankle me.

'Like the countless victims of this 'victimless crime' I knew that I now had to devote time to get the window repaired and pay for an unexpected expense.

'It is all annoying as hell as that broken and loose glass remains days and months later!

'After mentally sorting through the repair process my next thought turns to the dilemma of: to report or not to report?

'I, of all people, know the probability of this type of crime being solved in this city with someone being held responsible.

'So, I think to myself, 'Screw it,' I am one of thousands of people in San Francisco that will not report a crime.

'The reality is, with our limited resources, there are much more serious crimes in need of attention and my broken window is not one of them.'

McCray said residents have been so frustrated by the thefts that they leave notes for would-be burglars.

'People are even leaving notes on their car saying, 'Hey, I have nothing inside. Just don't break my window.,'' she said.

'It's really sad to think about that because you just want to come in and enjoy the city, but you have to worry about something like that happening.'

San Francisco is reeling from soaring crime, an emptying downtown, and residents moving away to safer, cheaper areas

Supervisor Dean Preston, whose district includes several hot spots for car break-ins in neighborhoods such as Alamo Square and Japantown, last month called for a hearing with the Mayor's Office, police, Municipal Transportation Agency and a other city departments to explain to the Board of Supervisors what is being done about the problem.

'Despite many announcements, the city has made no noticeable progress in addressing this persistent issue,' he said.

'It's time to let the public know what's been working and what hasn't, and what can be done collaboratively to finally reduce car break-ins.

'Meanwhile, residents continue to deal with broken car windows, stolen possessions, and shattered glass on streets and sidewalks, while visitors are left with trauma, financial loss, and less-than-ideal memories of their visits.'

A police spokesman told The San Francisco Standard that they were working to identify members of criminal gangs.

'We understand that perpetrators are organized and often come from outside the city to prey on the residents and the many visitors to our city,' said Robert Rueca.

'We are working to identify these networks of criminals and we're making arrests.'

The startling car-theft footage came shortly after workers in the main federal building in San Francisco were ordered to work from home indefinitely, due to conditions in the surrounding Downtown area.

The stay-home order was sent to staffers in the 18-story Nancy Pelosi Federal Building - which cost taxpayers $144million to construct - on August 4

The area outside the building is now considered the biggest of all the open-air drug markets across the city, after suddenly sprouting up earlier this year. Today, somewhere between 50 to 100 dealers operate on the street daily, usually doing so undeterred and in broad daylight

The federal government issued the stay-home order in a memo to staffers in the 18-story Nancy Pelosi building on August 4.

The building - which cost taxpayers $144million to create - houses the former House speaker's office, as well as various agencies operating under President Joe Biden.

Opened in 2007 and renamed after Pelosi this year, it sits adjacent to the city's Tenderloin District - which, set in the center of the city's Downtown, has become a haven for open-air drug use and often violent criminals.

Cheryl Campbell, the first woman of color to be sworn in as the Department of Health and Human Services' assistant secretary for administration, sent the memo on August 4.

'In light of the conditions at the [Speaker Nancy Pelosi Federal Building] we recommend employees … maximize the use of telework for the foreseeable future,' the administrator said.

The rest of the city, meanwhile, is not faring much better - especially other parts of the Downtown area, which has surfaced as the biggest problem spot as it experiences an unprecedented homeless and crime crisis.

It has lead to a mass exodus of retailers such as Whole Foods, Anthropologie, Old Navy, AmazonGo, Saks Off Fifth, and Office Depot.

The site where the building sits has proved particularly troublesome in terms of security - as it has become a point of congregation for countless dealers who routinely plant themselves outside or across the street from the property

The government reportedly advised federal workers to stay home 'for the foreseeable future', due to the dangers that come with commuting to the now overrun neighborhood

The filth and squalor at the junction of Jones and Eddy Streets in San Francisco's Tenderloin District, a couple blocks from federal building, is seen here

A woman lies passed out in front of a children's play area. Even upscale areas such as Russian Hill, which is part of the cable car route along Hyde Street, and tourist hotspots like the Golden Gate Bridge have been affected

Since the start of the pandemic - which for months left the Bay Area at the mercy of homeless tent encampments and bands of career criminals - more than 95 retailers including Brooks Brothers, Ray Ban, Christian Louboutin, Lululemon, and Marmot have packed up and left the city.

Industry groups have noted that there is an issue with theft, with the National Retail Federation saying that organized retail crime is setting stores back around $100 billion a year, according to a 2022 survey.

In 2021, retailers saw a 27 per cent increase in theft carried out by organized criminal rings, the survey found.

To tackle the issue, they invested more money in safety and security measures to protect employees, customers and merchandise.

Despite official reports that San Francisco's crime rate is on the way down, one former prosecutor claimed in May that the city's liberal district attorney's decision not to prosecute many crimes skewed those numbers.

Almost 7,000 households a month also fled the city at its peak in August 2020, as soft-on-crime policing and facilitation of widespread homelessness sparked backlash.

The crisis has now seemingly spread to the city's real estate market, as Lendlease's executive general manager Arden Hearing said he would be 'pausing construction on Hayes Point until markets normalize and we're able to bring in early tenancy commitments, or a capital partner, or both.'

Hayes Point was one of the few remaining construction projects underway in San Francisco, and its halting comes as a major upset to city officials, after they introduced measures to revive the downtown area around it.