Dodge thefts continue to rage...
If you think the whole car theft trend is waning, think again. While it’s too early to have all the stats for this year, early figures show if anything car thefts are increasing. Even more troubling is the increase in violent carjackings. Fortunately this story of a Dodge Challenger swiped in downtown Detroit doesn’t involve violence, but it’s still frustrating to see.
Learn about the Dodge security update here.
A surveillance camera caught the crime as it went down. Two men pull up in a newer Dodge Charger which you might not doesn’t have any plates. Most likely that Mopar is stolen, a common tactic for these crime rings.
One man gets out of the passenger side of the Charger, walks up to the target Challenger, and climbs through the open passenger window. Why the windows were left down is a mystery, but that’s obviously a bad idea. Still, we’ve seen thieves jimmy open doors, break windows, and even force sunroofs open to get inside Dodge muscle cars.
These guys were obviously trying to make as little noise as possible. In the video you can see the one suspect closes the Charger’s passenger door super softly, looking around to be sure nobody is watching before he approaches the Challenger he’s about to steal.
As we’ve seen repeatedly, the guy who gets into the Challenger is carrying a small device in his hand. It’s used by locksmiths to program new keys to a vehicle’s ignition, but these guys use them to program the ignition to accept keys they’re already carrying. It takes only a few minutes to complete. While Dodge has rolled out an update aimed at stopping this, we continue to see Challengers and Chargers stolen using this method.
With both of these car thieves showing their faces toward the surveillance camera, Detroit Police Department is asking the public for help identifying them. Anyone who might know who they are is being asked to call 313-596-2555 or 1-800-Speak-Up.
