The mob that crashed an SUV through the front door of Kim Hung Jewelry in San José arrived in multiple vehicles and carried out their smash-and-grab robbery in less than a minute.

The masked robbers stormed through the shattered storefront, brandishing hammers, at least one gun and trash bags to haul away the merchandise, according to police.

The brazen daylight heist, which was caught on video, prompted an angry response from lawmakers, public safety advocates and Vietnamese community leaders who called for increased law enforcement resources to combat organized crime rings. It has also forced the Vietnamese family running the jewelry story to consider abandoning the business.

“This happens way too often, this doesn’t have to happen,” said Tuan Ngo, an organizer with a public safety advocacy group called Asians Unite.

Moments before the robbery Friday, the 88-year-old store owner and his adult son were getting ready to close the family business on Aborn Road in the nondescript strip mall. They stowed away most of their jewelry into a safe just after 2 p.m., according to relatives. That’s when a gray SUV backed into a parking spot outside and jumped the curb, crashing into the front entrance.

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The gray Ford Explorer crumbled a metal security gate and shoved a long display case back several feet. In surveillance video from inside the store, the father and son are seen jumping at the loud crash. The father appeared stunned, while the son runs away from the gnarled metal and broken glass. Relatives declined to identify the father and son for fear of retaliation from the robbers.

After a brief pause, the SUV pulled away and the mob stormed in through the gaping maw that was once the front door. The group wore knit caps, gloves, masks and hooded sweaters.

“Everybody get the f— down!” one of the suspects shouted, according to surveillance video.

The son fell to the floor and the father cried out as the masked thieves smashed display cases with hammers. One hooded robber grabbed an object out of the store owner’s hands and another shoved the elderly man to the floor.

At one point, a masked suspect appeared to point a handgun at the son. The group raced around the store, gathering items and dropping them into trash bags. The entire robbery unfolded in about 40 seconds, according to the surveillance video shared with The Times.

The group ran outside and jumped into at least four vehicles waiting in the parking lot. They left behind the SUV used to smash into the storefront.

The San José Police Department said the agency has no information to release about the suspects and the case is being investigated by the robbery unit.

The store owner’s niece, Linh, said her uncle is afraid, traumatized and uncertain whether he wants to keep the family business open. Linh declined to give her last name out of concern for her safety.

“We just don’t know if there will be a business there anymore,” she said. She said she feels “traumatized, angry, bad, sad.”

Linh said her uncle arrived in California over 40 years ago from South Vietnam and raised his family in and around San José.

“He’s a family man [who loves] his family,” Linh said.

She arrived at the store about 10 minutes after the robbery.

“He was very scared. He just kept speaking in Vietnamese,” Linh said. “Ối giời ơi, Ối giời ơi. Oh my god, oh my god.”

She noticed her uncle’s feet were bloodied from walking on broken glass in sandals and he was staring off into the distance and appeared to be in a fog. His voice was uneven and he wouldn’t say more than a few words at a time, she said. After a visit to a hospital, relatives learned that the elderly man had suffered a stroke. He spent the weekend in the hospital and by Wednesday the family said that he was recuperating at home.

Although a recent study from financial tech company SmartAsset ranked San José as one of the nation’s safest major cities, the robbery drew angry condemnations and calls for increased law enforcement.

The Vietnamese community rallied outside the jewelry store Tuesday evening, calling for better policing and more funding for public safety. They held signs that say “End Smash & Grab” and that call for the state to implement tougher penalties for criminals as approved by voters in November under Proposition 36.

Mayor Matt Mahan said San José is angry about the state of crime and acknowledged that the surveillance video of the smash-and-grab robbery “made his blood boil.”

Public safety advocacy groups have seized on the moment to ask state legislators and Gov. Gavin Newsom to increase policing and install more license plate readers in and around the Bay Area. The Coalition for Community Engagement, a group that supported the 2024 recall of Oakland’s mayor and Alameda County’s district attorney, pointed to the San José smash-and-grab as another example of crime run rampant.

“These are organized crime rings that operate around California. It was just San José’s turn on the list,” said Coalition for Community Engagement founder Edward Escobar.

Linh, the store owner’s niece, said her family is not asking for donations for her uncle’s store or his recovery.

“We just only are asking for prayer and wishes for him to get better,” she said. “We want everybody to know about the safety of our businesses right now.”

Poland said Wednesday that, along with NATO allies, it had scrambled warplanes to shoot down multiple Russian drones that entered its airspace during Moscow’s latest attack on Ukraine, calling the incident an “act of aggression.”

“Last night the Polish airspace was violated by a huge number of Russian drones,” Prime Minister Donald Tusk said in a social media post. “Those drones that posed a direct threat were shot down. I am in constant communication with the Secretary General of NATO and our allies.”

Poland’s military said it scrambled aircraft to shoot down “hostile objects” in Polish airspace, a first for a NATO country during the war. The military, in a post on X, called it “an unprecedented violation of Polish airspace by drone-type objects” and an “act of aggression that posed a real threat to the safety of our citizens.”

The European Union’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, said early indications suggested the Russian drone incursion into Poland’s airspace was intentional.

“Last night in Poland we saw the most serious European airspace violation by Russia since the war began, and indications suggest it was intentional, not accidental,” Kallas said in a statement. “The EU stands in full solidarity with Poland. Russia’s war is escalating, not ending. We must raise the cost to Moscow, strengthen support for Ukraine, and invest in Europe’s defense.”

Russia’s Ministry of Defense said its drones had not targeted Poland, but Moscow’s close ally, Belarus, said it tracked some drones that “lost their course” after being jammed, according to The Associated Press. Polish officials have said some of the drones were launched from Belarus, which Russian forces have used as a base for both ground and aerial attacks on Ukraine throughout the war.

In a statement posted on social media, a NATO spokesperson said fighter jets from the Netherlands were deployed and helped to shoot down the drones, confirming it was “the first time NATO aircrafts have engaged potential threats in Allied airspace.”

In addition to the direct response by Polish and Dutch fighter jets, German Patriot missiles based in Poland “were placed on alert,” and an Italian airborne early warning aircraft and a NATO refueler aircraft were also launched, according to the statement from NATO spokesperson, Col. Martin L. O’Donnell.

“NATO responded quickly and decisively to the situation, demonstrating our capability and resolve to defend Allied territory,” Gen. Alexus G. Grynkewich, NATO’s commander for Europe, said in a statement shared with CBS News.

“My thanks and congratulations to the Polish Operational Command and our NATO pilots for shooting down Russian drones over Poland,” Poland’s Prime Minister Tusk said in a later social media post. “Actions speak louder than words.”

“We stand by our NATO Allies in the face of these airspace violations and will defend every inch of NATO territory,” U.S. Ambassador to NATO Matthew Whitaker said Wednesday in a social media post, in the first reaction from a senior American official to the Russian incursion into Poland’s airspace.

Apparent Russian drones and missiles have entered the airspace of NATO members previously, including Poland’s, several times during Russia’s three-and-a-half-year war, but no NATO country had ever tried to shoot them down.

A cornerstone of the Western NATO military alliance is the principle that an attack on any member is considered an attack on all. A NATO source told the Reuters news agency that the alliance wasn’t treating the Russian drone incursion into Polish territory as an attack, but that it did appear to have been deliberate.

Tusk told Poland’s parliament that authorities had identified 19 violations of the country’s airspace overnight and shot down at least three drones, adding that no one was harmed in the “Russian action.”

Tusk said Poland had made a “formal request to invoke Article 4” of the NATO alliance’s founding treaty. Under Article 4, any member can call urgent talks when it feels its “territorial integrity, political independence or security” are at risk.

The Polish case marked the eighth time the article has been invoked since the alliance was founded in 1949, and the third time Article 4 has been invoked to address Russia’s incursions into and invasion of Ukraine. 

NATO’s collective security is based on its Article 5 principle, which states that if one member is attacked, the entire alliance will come to its defense. That article has only been invoked once in the history of NATO, by the United States, following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Poland’s military said efforts were “underway to search for and locate the possible crash sites of these objects” and “the Operational Command of the Polish Armed Forces is monitoring the current situation, and Polish and allied forces and assets remain fully prepared for further actions.”

Polish police said officers had discovered a damaged drone in the eastern Polish village of Czosnowka, according to Reuters, and there were reports that a building was damaged by a falling drone or debris in another eastern Polish town, but there were no reports of any injuries.

Hours later, Poland’s military said on X that the operations had concluded but the search for downed drones was continuing. “We urge that in the event of observing an unknown object or its debris, do not approach, touch, or move it. Such elements may pose a threat and contain hazardous materials. They must be thoroughly inspected by the appropriate services,” the military cautioned.

The Polish government announced it would hold an “extraordinary” meeting Wednesday morning.

The incursion came as Russia unleashed a barrage of strikes across Ukraine, including in the western city of Lviv, around 50 miles from the Polish border.

Warnings of further Russian aggression

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Wednesday that eight Russian drones were “aimed toward” Poland in an overnight barrage that forced Warsaw to scramble air defenses. “It was not just one Shahed that could be called an accident, but at least eight strike drones aimed toward Poland,” Zelensky said, referring to Iranian-designed drones deployed by Moscow, adding that the incident represented “An extremely dangerous precedent for Europe.”  

Ukraine’s foreign minister, Andriy Sybiga, warned on X that Russian President Vladimir Putin “just keeps escalating, expanding his war, and testing the West. The longer he faces no strength in response, the more aggressive he gets. A weak response now will provoke Russia even more — and then Russian missiles and drones will fly even further into Europe.”

Poland’s newly-elected nationalist President Karol Nawrocki issued a warning along the same lines Tuesday, saying at a news conference in Helsinki that, “We do not trust Vladimir Putin’s good intentions. We believe that Vladimir Putin is ready to also invade other countries.”

European Union chief Ursula said Moscow had carried out a “reckless and unprecedented” violation of Polish airspace.

And the EU’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, posted on X Wednesday that “we saw the most serious European airspace violation by Russia since the war began, and indications suggest it was intentional, not accidental. The EU stands in full solidarity with Poland. Russia’s war is escalating, not ending.”

NATO-member Poland, a major supporter of Ukraine, hosts over a million Ukrainian refugees and is a key transit point for Western humanitarian and military aid to the war-torn country.

Last month, Warsaw said a Russian military drone flew into its airspace and exploded in farmland in eastern Poland and depicted the incident as a “provocation.” In 2023, Poland said a Russian missile had crossed into its airspace to strike Ukraine. And in November 2022, two civilians were killed when a Ukrainian anti-aircraft missile fell on a village near the border.