Police officers staking out San Francisco’s Russian Hill neighborhood for car burglars caught a group of armed robbers in the act of mugging three women sightseers who just visited the iconic crooked part of Lombard Street — and the whole bust was caught on security video.

The incident happened Saturday afternoon on the 1000 block of Filbert Street, officials said Monday.

Kordell Jamal Carter, 20, of Santa Rosa, 20-year-old Pravin Kevin Lal, of Marin City, and 19-year-old Lamar Akeli Fontenot of Antioch were arrested on suspicion of robbery, conspiracy, possession of stolen property, and possession of firearms, police said.

Carter was also booked on a felony burglary warrant from Marin County. Fontenot was additionally facing possession of burglary tool charges.

Security video taken by a nearby Nest cam and posted on YouTube showed police swooping in to arrest the suspects, including one being tackled by an officer. The robbery and arrests all occurred in about two minutes.

A team of plainclothes police from Central Station were staking out the area due to a rash of recent car break ins, when the officers noticed the men driving a car in the area with no license plate and committing several traffic violations, which officials said were taken as red flags.

“Typically, a lot of criminals will drive and look for targets,” said Officer Carlos Manfredi, a police spokesman. “They’ll go through stop signs to see if they can catch up to the victims.”

Just after 1 p.m., the suspects parked a gray Chrysler convertible uphill on the 1000 block of Filbert Avenue. The video showed the men waiting until the group of women, walking down Filbert after visiting the curvy section of Lombard, passed them before jumping out of the car, showing a gun and demanding the victims’ belongings, police said.

Two of the women struggled with the men over a backpack and a camera, before being overpowered, police said. The third victim ran away screaming for help as the suspects piled back into the Chrysler, police said.

In seconds, one officer sprinted uphill to the scene while another stopped the car from getting away.

Two officers with weapons drawn surrounded the car and pulled the suspects out, while another officer drove up, jumped out and tackled one of the suspects to the ground.

In a matter of seconds, all three suspects were in custody.

Authorities recovered the victims’ belongings and seized a loaded handgun from the suspects that was reported stolen in Louisiana, police said. The women were “shaken up” and sustained minor injuries, police said.

“We continue to not only address violence and property crime on Russian Hill as we deploy officers there daily, but we are also committed to combating crime throughout the Central Police District,” Central Station commanding officer Capt. David Lazar said in a statement.

Lal was being held Monday on $420,000 bail, Fontenot was being held on $473,000 bail and Carter was being held on $520,000 bail.

Jenna Lyons is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jlyons@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @JennaJourno