A surge of extreme smash-and-grab robberies targeting California’s jewelry shops has made the Jewelers’ Security Alliance (JSA) issue a special warning for all business owners. The recent “crime spree” is one of the most massive in American history.
The Executive Vice President of JSA, Scott Guginsky, said that the robberies were very blatant, as if done on a dare. “In all my years on the job, I’ve never seen so many cars driving headfirst into jewelry stores and basically ramming and entering.”
The gangs typically consisted of 10 to 30 people who all drove in stolen cars. They were breaking into storefronts by using these vehicles as battering rams. Once the windows were broken, other cars would pull up from the sides, and people with pickaxes and hammers would emerge. They then scuttled inside and raided display cases with custom wedding bands and other pieces.
Since March, JSA has registered 17 robberies following this pattern. The absolute majority of these incidents occurred in Northern California. There have also been four cases in Southern California, and one in the central part.
One incident in Northern California was particularly unsuccessful for the gang. On July 17, 2025, the group tried to attack the Al-Amira Jewelry store in Anaheim. 18 people were wearing black-and-white clothes and masks. In the security footage, one can clearly see people pulling up cars and quickly entering the shop. But things escalated very quickly when the owner shot at the robbers, making them run away. Interestingly, the news also points out that a store across the street was also attacked, however, with less favorable outcomes.
In 12 of all the smash-and-grab cases, robbers rammed stolen cars into the front of the buildings in order to access the store. In the rest of the cases, criminals used a different approach and entered the store with hammers without any car ramming. Unfortunately, the robberies were done in the afternoon, when workers and clients were still on the site, which increased the threat to public safety.
The Olertis team hopes the police will soon catch these bad guys so that Californian jewelry store owners can finally sleep peacefully.
