Aarg! Homeless Pirates Pillage Leisure Boats In San Francisco Bay

There's a new, maritime dimension to the scourge of rampant crime in northern California cities, as homeless creeps are now taking to the water and preying on houseboats and yachts docked on San Francisco Bay, reports Fox News. 

"Multiple vessels have been stolen and ransacked. Victims have had to resort to personally confronting the criminals to recover their property without the benefit of police support," said former harbor master Brock de Lappe at a recent municipal meeting. "Is this appropriate activity for a 79-year-old senior?"

The 3,000-slip Oakland-Alameda Estuary has been particularly hard-hit, as thieves use small boats to burglarize or steal private boats on the waterway. The pirates use stolen boats or old, abandoned dinghies to carry out their raids. 

A boating school for children has seen four of its eight safety boats stolen and destroyed. The boats cost the school between $25,000 and $35,000 apiece. "We cannot run our program without these boats," wrote Kame Richards, owner of the nonprofit Alameda Community Sailing Center, in a letter to his municipal commission.

"The response we received from APD (Alameda Police Department) was that they could do nothing, and a warning not to approach the perpetrators if we located our boats," added Richards. Sounds about par for the course in a state where the Senate has advanced a bill that would criminalize retail-store policies requiring employees to attempt to thwart thieves. 

"We had all hands on deck to retrieve this stuff, and it took 35 hours to get a police report number from the Alameda Police Department," said Richards during a municipal meeting. The school is on the verge of calling it quits.

Another woman scared a troubling tale, telling Fox that she recently heard faint cries of "help me, please, please, anybody help me" coming from the inky darkness of the estuary. She dared to venture out with her kayak and a headlamp, and found a sailboat with a "panicked and terrified young man" aboard. He said pirates cut his sailboat line and set him adrift after a confrontation. 

"If there had been any wind at the time I wouldn't have been able to go out there and rescue this young man who had no motor and no ability to sail that boat," said his rescuer, who requested anonymity for fear of reprisals. 

Things have deteriorated to the point that a group that has regularly volunteered to clean up the waterway for the past six years cancelled this year's event "because of safety concerns" arising from a particularly concerning homeless encampment. "Unfortunately, I don't feel comfortable bringing children to the site until those are addressed by the city of Oakland," said the group's leader, Mary Spicer. 

Alameda island has received high marks for suburban livability, but that's in jeopardy as it's increasingly feeling the ill effects of being across a narrow channel from Oakland and its skyrocketing homeless population. The island city has no maritime police equipment, and has seen its police force shrink by 30% in recent years.