It is no pleasant thing to wake up to find that your car is no longer outside your front door. Nor is it the greatest fun to spend your Sunday morning with the police on the other side of your coffee table. Yet such scenarios have begun to be a regular occurrence for the residents of Monkhams Drive in Woodford Green.
Within the last six months the Monkhams residents have experienced a series of attempted break-ins and more importantly, frequent car theft. A total of four cars have been stolen from neighbours next door to each other since the summer, including a very recent theft of two cars from one family this week. Having returned home from a brief half-term vacation, their two vehicles were stolen during the early hours of the following morning. It was assumed by the police that thieves had used a long hooking device through their letterbox to retrieve the car keys on a bookshelf, so as not to wake the sleeping residents.
“It’s shocking and inconvenient” said the owner of the stolen cars, Mrs Duffy, “On the one hand; the police tell us that we were foolish to keep our keys by the front door, which I accept. But on the other hand, this is our house and we should be able to keep our keys wherever we like in it. Our cars are not as valuable to the people who took them as they are to us, a busy family with six people in it who all need to get to many different locations every day.”
Car theft is on the rise in this area, but perhaps not for reasons first thought. One of the two cars stolen was a large, 7-seater family car –hardly a vehicle worth stealing to use as a getaway car. It is thought that such a large car was stolen for purposes as a car for travelling purposes to transport the thieves from venue to venue.
There are several things you can do to prevent car theft; making sure that all doors and windows are securely locked as well as making sure that no belongings are left unattended in the car. Furthermore, with car security systems becoming far more effective, it is becoming more and more common for thieves to break into the owner’s house to steal the keys. To take note from the Duffy’s case, it is advised that car keys are kept well hidden and out of sight, and to make sure they are not visible through a door or a window.
Nevertheless, car theft is still a terrible event to happen to anyone, and it seriously affects the lives of victims, both emotionally and financially. Recent reports of car theft in the last few months have really hit home to many about just how serious an issue this is quickly becoming.