Valentino Luchin, 62 years old, is now in a prison cell in San Bruno, a small town in the Bay Area, charged with robbing three banks within a few minutes in the middle of San Francisco. For many who knew him in the area it was not only news of news, but the unexpected return of a person who for years had remained on the margins after a career in catering full of awards, tensions and attempts to share. And for the police it is not even a new name: in 2018 Luchin had already been arrested for a similar robbery in Orinda, not far away.
The episode of seven years ago, also rebuilt by the New York Times, had shown a agitated man who had presented himself to the door with a compressed air gun, getting about 18 thousand dollars before fleeing on a black Mercedes in 1997. He was spotted and stopped in the day. After a second-degree robbery conviction and six months in a county prison, Luchin returned to the kitchen in an attempt to bring his professional life together.
Before problems with justice, his name was long circulated in the Italian West Coast restaurants. Born in Este, in the province of Padua, he started working at 15 years and moved to the United States in the early 1990s. After the period at Becco in New York and some uses between Seattle and luxury hotels in Florida and Hawaii, in 2007 he had arrived to drive the cuisine of Rose Pistola, a local historian of San Francisco specializing in Ligurian dishes. He was considered a competent and meticulous chef, but also difficult in relationships: Former colleagues have spoken of a complex temperament and problems in cost management.
The occasion of a restaurant arrived in 2010, when entrepreneur Kenneth Maraccini invested in the Ottavio project, open to Walnut Creek. The local, small and very concentrated on its own production, was welcomed by local criticism, becoming a point of reference for fresh pasta and for some less common preparations in the Italian restaurant of the area. The presence of Luchin in the hall, with its marked accent and the central role of the restaurant, contributed to the loyalty of customers.
Valentino Luchin
Over time, however, Ottavio occupied debts and litigation. A supplier sued for missing payments, two former employees obtained compensation for unpaid wages and tips, and the liquor license was seized by a banker to be resented in an attempt to recover part of the sums due. In 2013 Luchin and his wife had already detected the restaurant committing to repay Maraccini for a sum of approximately 100 thousand dollars, but after the failure of 2015 the economic situation worsened quickly: income considered low for the area, missed payments to creditors and the subsequent closure of the premises.
After Ottavio, the professional parable of Luchin continued with some short assumptions: a failed attempt to get a place like sous-chef from a nearby restaurant, a period at the Double Zero in San Francisco – where, he told one of the owners, “we wanted to give him a chance” – and a more recent assignment at the Old Clam House, without his previous penalty being mentioned in public presentations. In 2019 he had filed for personal failure under Chapter 7, with debts for over $100,000 and pendence on unpaid salaries.
The robberies of 10 September 2025 arrived after a particularly unstable period. Recently, Luchin had told him that he had tried to move to Maui for a job that was then nurtured, that he had two motorcycle accidents and had undergone a rehabilitation path for addiction problems. In divorce papers, presented last year, he claimed to earn less than $40,000 and not be able to support food, while the former wife asked for a restraining order for verbally aggressive behavior.
According to the transcripts, the modus operandi was almost equal in all three banks in the center of San Francisco: the man would have handed over to several employees a note written “This is a robbery”, hiding behind a black mask. The first robbery took place around noon at CTBC Bank in Chinatown. The second one, right after, at BMO Bank. Finally, a branch of the Bank of America. Here, a cashier would have recognized him as the chef had recently tried to cash out an unsuccessful check. The police then tracked him to a nearby hostel. Luchin now has to respond to two second-degree robbery charges and two attempted robbery in the same category, with deposit set at $200,000.
In prison he is known as “the chef”, a nickname given to him by the ten inmates with whom he shares his cell. In a phone call to the New York Times he said he was “very stressed”, adding that “when you have a collapse you don’t have reasons well”. He also told us to spend time reading and training, and to have in mind the idea of a restaurant that takes people with criminal precedents. In the meantime the consequences of his years in the restaurant remain open: former employees with backward salaries recognized by the court, never paid suppliers and the Maraccini family, or rather the widow of the former business partner of Luchin, who died in 2023, still waiting for the refunds provided by the sale of Ottavio.
Article The Italian chef who robbed three banks in a day in San Francisco comes from IlNewyorkese.
L’articolo Lo chef italiano che ha rapinato tre banche in un giorno a San Francisco proviene da IlNewyorkese.
