Law enforcement warns against car thefts during the holiday shopping season
COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)
Law enforcement agencies say vehicle thefts go up during the holiday season, urging last-minute shoppers to be cautious.
Capt. Brian Leer with the Boone County Sheriff's Department said car thefts usually are more frequent during the holiday season and specifically the wintertime because it's common for people to leave their cars running to warm up.
"They start getting them warmed up or putting their gifts that they're buying in their vehicle, that's always a time whenever, maybe, they're a little bit more vulnerable because they're distracted," Leer said.
2020 saw the most vehicle thefts in more than a decade. Beginning in June 2020, the United States experienced a 13% increase in auto thefts, with 41 states seeing an increase over the previous year, a trend that has continued throughout 2021.
The Boone County Sheriff's Department responded to 29.63% more vehicle thefts in 2020 than in 2019 and that number was up by 40.26% for the Columbia Police Department.
Leer said criminals usually target people when they are most vulnerable and caught off guard. He suggests people always be aware of these situations.
"If a car is outside running and unattended, that's a hazard. If they go by and notice that there's some gifts or a bunch of merchandise inside a vehicle," Leer said. "All that stands between them and merchandise is often an unlocked door or if they choose to knock a window out and get in the vehicle to gain access to the gifts for merchandise."
In these cases, Leer suggests keeping valuables hidden in vehicles and taking some extra steps to protect merchandise.
"Everybody nowadays has a smartphone that has a camera on there, so anything that's valuable that they purchase, I would suggest taking pictures of the merchandise with the serial number," Leer said. "If it is stolen, we can enter it in with the make, model, serial number into the mules NCIC computer and then that will enable us to then identify the property later if we retrieve it."
With hundreds of cars in shopping center parking lots, Leer also recommends that people look out for one another.
"We do encourage others to just watch out for other people and be a good witness if you can. Again, smartphones, everybody has them and you can record stuff in progress. That helps us later to identify the perpetrators," Leer said.
The sheriff's department said in a Facebook post that it was looking for the owners of several stolen items on Tuesday.
