Crime & Safety

How Many Cars are Stolen in Berkeley and How Can Auto Theft Be Prevented?

This week's Q&A with the Berkeley Police Department focuses on auto theft — the most popular crime in Berkeley — and how it can be prevented.

Q: How many reports of stolen cars do you get, and what percentage do you recover? 

Answer by Sgt. Mary C. Kusmiss S-6 BPD Public Information Officer.

Thus far in the year 2011, the City of Berkeley Police Department (BPD) receives an average of between one to two cars stolen each day throughout the city. These numbers or more formally known as crime statistics have been steadily declining in recent years. As an example, since auto theft is a Part 1 Crime and reported to the FBI for the Uniform Crime Reporting Statistics, a community member can access their website and review the auto theft or stolen vehicle statistics.

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In the last five years our UCR statistics for auto theft are as follows:

Year: Number of Auto Thefts: 2006 1075 2007 995 2008 952 2009 727 2010 615

 

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If you are a community member that has had his/her car stolen, you know best how frustrating, surprising, emotional and infuriating it can be. We base this list on the range of emotion that BPD officers experience from victims when their car is not where they parked it and discover it has been stolen.

Gone really are the days and TV/movie depictions of suspects hot wiring cars. Certain types of cars are very easy to steal such as Toyotas, Saturns, Hondas, and Acuras and when we and our detective-colleagues from other agencies have interviewed suspects, they often share their methods. They say they become very adept at the crime and can steal a car or truck or other vehicle within seconds at times.

Unlike southern California and other parts of the country, suspects who steal cars in Berkeley primarily steal cars for transportation, to joyride, use the gas, smoke and use drugs in it or use it to commit another crime. Once the tank of gas is empty or another crime is committed, the suspect or suspects will “dump” the car somewhere — either a neighboring community or within the City of Berkeley. We find few instances of chop shops or car stripped for parts here, although it happens periodically, especially if the car has fancy wheels.

In the last few weeks, the following number of cars have been reported stolen in Berkeley:

June 19 to June 25  14 June 26 to July 2 7 July 3 to July 9 13

Q: How can you best protect your car from being stolen in Berkeley?

The best proven deterrent nationally and internationally is a steering wheel locking device (aka The Club or like). It is an inexpensive crime prevention tool and IT WORKS. 

Auto thieves, like other individuals who commit crime, are opportunistic and prefer to go unseen/undetected. If they see a line of cars, they bypass the ones with the steering wheel locks to capitalize on the easy ones to steal.

Lastly, we recover over 80 percent of all vehicles stolen (that includes other agencies that find vehicles stolen from Berkeley). That percentage only increases as we find more and more of them all the time. There are a number of BPD officers that love looking and are very successful in finding stolen vehicles, both unoccupied and parked or occupied. Each vehicle License plate, VIN (Vehicle Identification Number), make, model year and registered owner information is entered into what is called SVS — Stolen Vehicle System and NCIC —National Crime Information Center. This is a searchable database.

Please avoid the inconvenience and disappointment. Buy a steering wheel locking device.

Sgt. Mary C. Kusmiss is a 16-year veteran of the Berkeley Police Department. 


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