Manhattan restaurants: We’re being hit hard by repeat smash-and-grabs

A thief smashed the glass door of Lower East Side Argentinian restaurant Balvanera around 4 a.m. Sunday morning fleeing with $400 from the cash drawer.

It’s the restaurant’s third break-in since last year, ringing up a tab of thousands of dollars in damages.

“Every time, they break the glass and walk right to the cash register,” Fernando Navas, chef and owner of Balvanera on Stanton St., told The Post. 

“I called 911. I told them, ‘I’m letting you know this is the third time [the restaurant was attacked],” Navas said.

He is not alone: Restaurant owners across Manhattan are being hit by an uptick in restaurant smash-and-grab burglaries, they tell The Post.

And some restaurateurs said they’ve suffered repeat attacks and have lost thousands in cash and computer equipment. Owners say a lack of police on patrol in the early hours and repeat offenders who face no repercussions are to blame. 

Burglaries on the Lower East Side, where Balvanera is located, have gone up 63.6% this year in the 28-day period ending June 25 compared to 2022, according to the NYPD.

“The break-ins are getting out of control. It was not like this pre-COVID,” Nick Moshkovich, director of operations at nearby Bonberi Mart on West 11th Street, which also experienced an attempted attack on May 14 around 5 a.m., told The Post. His neighbor, 11th Street Cafe, has also been hit with a string of smash-and-grab attacks.

“We’re on a quiet street — they’re [thieves] targeting us because there’s less foot traffic. Police drive by, but there’s no boots on the ground,” Moshkovich said.

Navas’ Balvanera was burglarized in November 2022 and again January 2022, with the glass front door destroyed and the cash drawer cleared out each time. Each time Navas closed the business for hours while waiting for detectives to survey the scene.

But he told The Post he can’t afford to lose any more money, he said, and when he was hit Sunday, he pressed ahead with business.

“I’m not going to go through the full report and wait four or five hours for the detective to come because I’m going to lose more money. If I don’t open for brunch, that’s another $4,000 or $5,000 that I lose,” he told The Post.

Since opening in 2014, Balvanera had only experienced one burglary before the pandemic hit in 2019. Since 2020, Navas said, things have gotten worse.

“There are less police on the streets. If you walk around the Lower East Side you see people who look like zombies — people on heroin, on fentanyl. It’s too hard to have a business” in NYC,” Navas said.

The repeat crimes, coupled with the expense of running a restaurant and living in New York City, has motivated Navas and his family to relocate permanently to Pittsburgh, where he has relatives, he said.

“It makes you think about closing the restaurant. What am I doing?” Navas, who will open an outpost of Balvanera in the coming months in Pittsburgh, said. “Small businesses suffer in New York.”

Across town, 11th Street Cafe and Osteria 57 in the West Village have all had overnight smash-and-grabs.

Hours after closing last Saturday night, 11th Street Cafe owner Philippe Bonsignour told The Post the restaurant suffered a second break-in, with a thief smashing its glass storefront. He declined to say if any cash was stolen.

“Somebody came in yanked the door open,” he said.

Emanuele Nigro, the co-owner of West Village Italian restaurant Osteria 57 on West 10th Street, said it suffered $8,000 in losses and damages when a smash-and-grab thief took around $4,000 in the cash drawer and made out with laptops, iPads and small appliances. 

“They were able to get in and take our money, computers – luckily, there was no major damage to the restaurant. They left the place intact, they just went for the money,” Nigro said about the break-in.

He also owns Alice on West 13th Street, where there was an attempted break-in around four months ago when a burglar unsuccessfully tried to force the door open. 

Nirgo says his restaurants have security cameras, however, he’s considering investing more than $1,000 to install a new gate with a stronger lock for Osteria 57. 

“It’s definitely a lot of aggravation for restaurateurs. What hurts us the most is the sense of alarm that gets put on the customers. There’s definitely this general atmosphere of alarm, and it’s not good for business,” Nigro said.

People in the area said thieves hide in outdoor dining sheds and strike after cops drive by.

“They tried to break in through the front. They sit there in the outdoor dining area, it’s usually between 5 and 6 a.m. I saw him waiting there and sneaking over and trying to break into my store,” Moshkovich told The Post, recalling watching a burglar attempt a break-in two months ago from security footage he turned over to cops.

“I don’t think they’ve come to any conclusion. It’s just ridiculous,” he said.