People v. Smith

I. Introduction

It was reported to be the largest jewelry heist in San Francisco history. Intruders entered a Union Square jewelry store while it was closed for the weekend, at a time when the store’s safe room was being remodeled, and the store’s security camera had exhausted its videotape and was not recording. A vacant restaurant space was located on the other side of the safe room’s interior wall. The restaurant’s exterior door had been rigged, by persons unknown, in a way that enabled the intruders to gain entry even though it was ostensibly locked. From the vacant restaurant, the intruders gained access to the jewelry store by cutting a hole through the common interior wall, in a location formerly occupied by a door. The hole led directly into the jewelry store’s safe room. Ordinarily, the safes would have been located flush against the common wall, preventing the robbers from entering. But, on this particular weekend the safes had been moved temporarily into the middle of the room due to the remodeling.

Once inside the jewelry store, the intruders briefly set off a motion detector alarm in the safe room, but when the alarm company called the store owner, he took…