[tptacek]

Carjacking is a subset of motor vehicle theft, which is an index crime, but carjacking commands more public attention than anything except for murder; this is a vibes-based assertion but I feel like I could back it up easily.

Importantly: the carjacking wave wasn't Foxx's fault (it was in fact Kia's fault). She was in an incredibly tough position --- she also had to deal with Chicagoland police departments that have not covered themselves in glory over the last 20 years. But she didn't rise to the challenge.

[phil21]

How is carjacking Kia’s fault? Kia had a problem with immobilizer anti-theft devices not being installed plus a well documented trivial way to “Hotwire” certain models. This would simply be car theft. It was a well documented (via social media) technique that lowered the skill level needed to steal a car to basically the ability to sit through a 30s TikTok.

Is it that it’s a “gateway crime” to full on carjacking? You get away with a few joy rides in a Kia and get bold enough to do an armed carjacking of someone’s SUV while they load their kids up in the alley garage?

Carjacking is up there with murder for “scary” urban crime because it’s violent and anyone can imagine being a victim. Having your car stolen off the street overnight doesn’t really elicit the same visceral response.

Add in the CPDs general “no chase” policy (mostly a good thing for harm reduction) plus a bunch of largely juveniles posting on social media the dangerous driving stunts they were pulling on social media to really amp up the fear and outrage. Even if it were mostly for show, no prosecutor is going to survive an election if they come across as soft on that style of crime.

[tptacek]

Carjacking relies on burner cars; they drive up near victims, 2 people get out and rush the car, and then both cars speed off. Carjackers (at least in Chicagoland) don't generally post up in parking lots waiting for victims; they're highly mobile.

(I have two carjackings on camera from behind my old house, where we had a Nest camera. One thing I learned from that: anybody who thinks carrying a firearm is a realistic defense against a carjacking is in fantasyland. You don't get even a split second to react; the encounter begins with a gun in your face.)

No-chase is absolutely the right policy for a dense urban area. Every once in awhile where I live we get trustee candidates promising to bring chases back, and I have to wonder what they're smoking.

[JumpCrisscross]

> Carjacking relies on burner cars; they drive up near victims, 2 people get out and rush the car, and then both cars speed off

Oh, I misunderstood the term. I thought you meant randos who steal cars.

This strikes me as the sort of violent crime that should be aggressively followed and punished.

> No-chase is absolutely the right policy for a dense urban area

Drones?

[phil21]

To avoid double-posting, replying here.

> Carjacking relies on burner cars; they drive up near victims, 2 people get out and rush the car, and then both cars speed off

Ah yeah, I forgot about this part. Makes sense. I also happen to have two (well, 1.5 - only caught the drive-away for one of them as the actual carjacking happened down the block) carjackings on my home cameras in the immediate post-COVID era. It happened in a similar manner here in one of the "very safe" neighborhoods of Chicago with burner cars. One of the burners was another stolen Mercedes - so I guess it's likely turtles all the way down until a KIA.

> Drones?

We have giant human-operated ones here in Chicago (helicopters) with at least one in the air seemingly all the time (according to my desktop ADS-B display). These coupled with the various traffic cameras spread all around seem to do a fairly effective job of tracking a stolen car if the police care enough to respond in time. Of course it's limited in the number of "chases" and available manpower.

Not sure why drones haven't made more of an entrance to this space. I think partly police union/labor issues, and partly the size of a drone needed to be useful enough (station keeping and response time) for the task would tend to look at lot like military surveillance drones. I vaguely remember some noise about about CPD trialing something like this, or it could have simply been "partnering" with Federal agencies during various recent protest activity. These are MQ-9 Reapers and similar drones in the class and they have been deployed over the city in recent memory.

I'm not sure giving CPD that capability is a great idea overall. If they end up having one or two drones in the sky 24x7 as a matter of course, surveillance concerns and abuse opportunities multiply. At least with the helicopters there is a large manpower and financial cost involved, and it's usually very obvious when one is deployed in your area due to noise.

[wallst07]

I still fail to see how carjacking rates are Kia's fault. I mean, Did carjackings increase everywhere relative to the % of kia's on the road in every area (urban and rural)?

[HDThoreaun]

Carjacking increased a lot in Chicago, seriously a huge amount, when TikTok started showing people how to steal Kia’s. It really wasn’t an issue at all until then

[JumpCrisscross]

> the carjacking wave wasn't Foxx's fault (it was in fact Kia's fault)

I leave my keys in my car and don’t lock my front door. That isn’t because of the local prosecutor. But it’s not to their demerit. If my car were stolen, I’d still expect them to at least do some work.

[HDThoreaun]

I think it might be because you live in an area that has created zoning laws that make it impossible for non rich people to sleep anywhere within an hour and a half of you. You live in Jackson hole right?

[tptacek]

I think a lot of the cars actually get recovered? It's a pretty fucked up situation; 16-22-year-olds seem pretty clearly to be doing it for sport.

[JumpCrisscross]

> 16-22-year-olds seem pretty clearly to be doing it for sport

If they’re getting away with it, with YouTube views to boot, it is* sport.

[UncleMeat]

Carjacking is when somebody opens your door at a stoplight, points a gun at you, and tells you to get out of the car. Are you instead referring to vehicle theft in general? How is this Kia's fault?

[tptacek]

Answered elsewhere on the thread.