Vehicle thefts spike in Cedar Rapids

Take your keys when you park your vehicle.

On Thursday, the Cedar Rapids Police Department reported 34 stolen vehicles since June 1. Police also say that 22 of the vehicles had the keys in the ignition and that more than half of the stolen cars and trucks were recovered.

“From an insurance standpoint, it's still a covered loss,” said Doug Valentine, an insurance agent with State Farm in Cedar Rapids.

Yet Valentine also said auto theft rates in the area are “way below” the national average and that, in 25 years in the industry, he has only had “five or six” total theft claims.

As for whether leaving the keys in the ignition are intentional or not, Valentine said insurance companies do work to determine a motive for why this can happen.

“Most of the companies have special investigative units and that, sometimes, there are reasons the keys are left in,” said Valentine. “People may be upside down in their loan and think the insurance will pay off.”

The 34 auto thefts in Cedar Rapids all occurred throughout the city and were not concentrated in specific neighborhoods where police calls are more common.

In an informal survey of walking city streets, reporter Chris Earl and intern Jon Householder peered inside the windows of 400 different cars and trucks across all four quadrants of the city. They found a total of seven vehicles with keys still in the ignition, ready to go.

“Sometimes I leave them in there,” admitted Adam Chaffee, on a sidewalk on the city's southeast side. When asked whether Chaffee worried about a thief stealing his car, Chaffee said, “Yeah, I worry about it. But it's never happened before.”

Valentine said the likelihood of having a car or truck stolen in Eastern Iowa is so low, compared with the national average, that his company does not offer “anti-theft” discounts.

The recent wave of auto thefts is leading to police asking all people in Cedar Rapids to avoid leaving keys inside of vehicles. Police also released some of the reasons they've been:

1. “That way I know where they are.”
2. “I don't have to worry about losing them.”
3. “My husband always loses them.”
4. “I was just too tired to carry them into the house.”
5. “I forgot.”
6. “I didn't think this happened in my neighborhood.”
7. “But my car was in the driveway.”
8. “I leave the keys in the ignition, so I don't drop them when I'm opening the garage door.”
9. “There was only a little bit of gas in it.”
10. “I didn't think anyone would want it.”