State disputes auto theft ranking

Friday, Sept. 12, 1997 | 10:41 a.m.

Law enforcement authorities concede Nevada is a haven for car thieves but say the state's high ranking in a recent auto theft survey is misleading.

USA Today reported that Nevada had the fourth highest rate of stolen vehicles per 100,000 residents in 1995, based on statistics from the FBI and National Insurance Crime Bureau.

The newspaper reported Nevada's rate at 745.4 thefts per 100,000 residents, trailing only Arizona (1,157.7), California (887.9), and Florida (785.8). Nevada's own official records for 1995 indicate a rate of 718 per 100,000, but that would still have placed the state fourth in the newspaper's survey.

Nevada's rate dropped to 663 last year, but neither the FBI nor state officials know whether that changed the state's ranking.

Jerry Hafen of the Nevada Division of Investigation in Las Vegas said he is skeptical of the ranking. In 1995, Nevada ranked sixth among 13 Western states in a study performed by the National Insurance Crime Bureau, he said. A year earlier, the bureau ranked the Las Vegas metropolitan area (including Nye County and parts of northern Arizona) 26th in the nation.

Local police also say Nevada's ranking is skewed because the newspaper survey didn't take into account the number of tourists in Las Vegas each weekend. A similar argument has been made by authorities when confronted with other studies that rank Nevada high in crime.

Sgt. Chuck Mangrum of Metro's auto theft detail said Nevada would rank much lower in stolen vehicles if tourists were considered.

"It means we have more cars than you would see normally for our population," Mangrum said. "You also have to look at the number of rental car agencies that we have."

North Las Vegas Police Lt. Chris Larontonda even termed Nevada's rating a "useless statistic" because of its tourism.

"There are people coming and going here constantly," he said. "At any one time there may be 250,000 (tourists) here for a weekend. That skews our numbers terribly."

Mangrum said Southern Nevada's 24-hour lifestyle also may be a contributing factor.

"Things are always open, so you can have crime happen at all different hours, and people use stolen vehicles to commit crimes," he said.

He estimated that 80 percent of the auto thefts in Metro's jurisdiction are committed by joy riders or others who need the cars to commit other crimes. The balance are professional criminals who sell cars overseas or run "chop shops," where the vehicles are dismantled for their parts.

The increased presence of chop shops is among reasons law enforcement authorities, including Metro, FBI, Nevada Division of Investigation and Nevada Highway Patrol, are forming a statewide auto theft task force. Hafen is supervising the seven-investigator unit, which will pursue car theft rings and odometer and insurance fraud schemes.

State statistics reveal that a vehicle is stolen every 46 minutes.

Ray Unsell, a special agent with the National Insurance Crime Bureau in Las Vegas, said chop shop activity is on the rise in Nevada because operators were driven from California through tougher enforcement in that state. Nevada is hoping its task force will be as effective as the one launched in California.

"There's a huge market for stolen vehicles overseas and for parts," Unsell said. "You actually get theft by demand."

Larotonda said he believes that if the chop shops are stopped, joy riding will also decrease because those individuals won't want to face the threat of prison. He predicted the task force would pay dividends within a year.

"All it will take is to hit three or four big chop shops, because they tend to roll over on each other," Larotonda said. "These guys are swapping parts on a routine basis."

Mangrum said one problem that is hard to overcome is the number of large hotel parking garages in town. Large parking lots left unattended are easy pickings for car thieves, he said.

"Some of these hotels have garages that are four, five, eight stories, and it's impossible to have a security person be on top of the entire area," Mangrum said. "A guy can get a car in 30 to 35 seconds."

Car alarms are usually a wise investment for motorists who want to protect their cars. Mangrum said added security measures such as steering wheel locking devices and cutoff switches that disable stolen vehicles are further protections that reduce the risk of theft.

"The more layers (of protection) you have the less the possibility your car will be stolen," he said.