Don’t Give Thieves the Opportunity — Lock Your Car!
Avoid the 'Crime of Opportunity' an Unlocked Vehicle Offers
While this photo from Staffordshire speaks to leaving a car to warm up unattended, Santa Barbara police advise drivers to lock their car doors to prevent easy access for theft. | Credit: South Staffs Police
“If you give a criminal an easy opportunity to commit a crime, they are going to do it,” said Sergeant Ethan Ragsdale of the Santa Barbara Police Department — specifically, petty thievery from unlocked cars countywide and outright grand theft auto.
The police department has investigated several incidents in which cars were broken into simply because they were left unlocked. One crime escalated after the thieves found the keys to an owner’s vehicle in the glove compartment of their other car, which the robbers had entered through an unlocked door.
No overall increase in vehicle theft has prompted the “lock your car doors” warning from the Police Department. It’s just a crime of opportunity that’s simply deterred by a locked door, Ragsdale said: “These are people looking for easy ins and quick outs.”
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