Crime Trend: Carjacking Home Burglars

When it comes to burglarizing a home, thieves only have a limited supply of methods and tricks they can utilize to gain access into your home. However, when it comes to finding ways to target a home, it seems the possibilities are endless.

The newest method added to a burglar’s bag of tricks is to raid your glove box.

Police have been seeing an increase in home burglaries, triggered by burglars breaking into cars at restaurants, movie theaters, gyms, and shopping malls. These criminals are not just breaking into vehicles, they are looking for your car’s registration to acquire your home’s address, and they know you’re not home because they’ve just seen you walk away from your car.

Think about it for a second: A burglar just broke into your car, knows you’re not home, and now knows the location of your vacant address! Pretty scary huh?

Recently, a Seattle woman was on a lunch date with her mother. She parked her car at a restaurant and went inside. When she returned, she discovered her car had been taken.

“The victim called police to report the stolen car, and then she had to call again once she got home because she realized she had been robbed,” said Lt. Dan Yourkoski of the Medina, WA Police Department. The thieves in this situation made off with $20,000 worth of jewelry!

Can you imagine being robbed by a burglar using your own car as his getaway vehicle? Ugh.

Most people don’t realize how long it takes a burglar to steal your valuables. In most cases it only takes 8-12 minutes. I personally know people who can’t type out an email in that timeframe let alone clear out a home of its most valued items.

So what can you do to defend yourself from these carjacking home burglars?

There are only a few things you can do to prevent yourself from being hit by these criminals:

• Take your car’s registration with you at all times or keep it locked in the glove compartment of your vehicle.
• Lock up your GPS in the glove compartment.
• Remove any items in your vehicle that show any personal information, such as your address.
• It wouldn’t hurt to look into some home security systems for optimum protection.

As stated above, burglars are always looking for new methods for targeting victims. Knowing how a burglar targets a home can improve your home security. Don’t be an easy target and protect yourself from the bad guys!