According to government and insurance industry data, while reports of

overall property crimes, that's things like robbery, theft, and vandalism, while

they fell between 2019 and 2022, car theft soared,

surpassing a million in 2022

for the first time in 14 years.

And in cities like Philadelphia, Chicago,

and Washington, DC, more and more Washington, D.C.

More and more car thefts are headline grabbing carjackings.

Alex Bicaro is a criminology professor at the University of Miami.

He's also the former director of the Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics.

Alex, why the big increase in car thefts?

So thanks for having me, John.

So look, I mean, the pandemic is really when we started to see the the upsurge in car thefts

Some of that was attributed to the ease of which some Kia and Hyundai models were able to be broken into and stolen.

There were reports of YouTube videos and those kinds of things.

But you also had a lot of people having their cars out and about,

and a lot of people don't have them locked up.

And so what started to happen is because they were. about and a lot of people don't have them locked up.

And so what started to happen is because they were quick and easy not only to steal, they're also

valuable for various kinds of parts.

And they're easily these cars and parts of cars.

It's a very quick crime to occur and very, very lucrative.

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