Car parts thieves

[hoosll]

My DS just moved (5 days) into a condo building in Alexandria VA ... last night a gang of car parts thieves hit their garage:

7 cars were damaged, all acuras or hondas: airbags, a driver door, the front end bodywork from an acura SUV, motor parts.

My son lost his airbag, broken window, cut electrical wires to disable alarms.

The police said it is probably a street racing gang from Baltimore area who steal parts on demand.

WWYD - Certain cars are just targets of thieves and my son owns one. I think he has been lucky that he hasn't been vandalized before in DC or Alexandria. Building manager says, "hey, we can put in a camera system but the thieves will just disable it" DS loves his car but in the end I think he should get something less desirable ...

 

[Arielle22]

I worked at a car dealership for 7.5 yrs and it happened a lot. Even with cameras the thieves were never caught because they knew to avoid the cameras; wear clothing that disguised themselves and not bring their cars on property so we couldn't trace them through the car.

Once we had a new BMW soft top on the front display pad. We were on a very busy main throughfare. The theives managed to steal the entire upholstry of the car without damaging the softtop. When you looked inside the seats and paneling were all gone.

Emblems and tires frequently got stolen also. We once had a car stolen and didn't notice until inventory was done. So sometime during the month the car was taken but we didn't know when.

While the thefts bothered us at least the professionals didn't do a lot of damage to the car removing what they wanted. Police suspected the thieves sold the parts to body shops or that the theives were from body shops and took specifically what was needed.

It was worse with amateurs. We had wheels stolen off a VW but the jack they used was too close to the next car. So every time the handle was moved it hit the other car. Not only did we lose tires on 1 car but the back panel on another.

 

[Glenn]

Two yrs ago my brother had his airbags stolen twice . The second time they had to break into his garage to get to the car. Nowdays hes replaced his side garage door with a steal one, his garage has an alarm which is always on & connected to 2 large bells (1 is way up in the peak of the garage & very hard to get to), his car alarm with a remote that will buzz on his key chain is always on and he also has a camera on the house with armored cable set very high. He also has a camera hidden in the garage with a visible dummy one. Overkill? maybe but he was really ticked the second time & he said no more. Yes nothing is theft proof but if he makes it a super pain they might go elsewhere. It also sounds like you need a new management company with their attitude.