Held Hostage

I ran into a neighbor of mine at Walgreen's last night. We were both picking up junk food. She mentioned that they recently started parking their vehicles in their fenced-in backyard due to theft. This surprised me since her husband is a cop. "It's a game," she said. Apparently people have been removing bits of their two Hummers (I know, I know) piece by piece. One day they realized that the caps to their gas tanks are gone, the next, pieces of chrome are missing from the exterior. The thieves know that they can't steal the cars because of the LoJack so they just peel pieces off bit by bit. It's no surprise that we live a block from a chop shop. It's not only theft though, the other day my neighbor came out and saw that one vehicle had two flat tires. There were no punctures. Someone had simply let all of the air out and replaced the caps.

"We're moving," she said. "It's worse than it was and not everyone is back yet," referring to the fact that there are still many empty but habitable homes in the streets surrounding ours. She brought up that the vandalism on their luxury vehicles was more than a case of her husband being a cop (who refuses to get involved with neighborhood disturbances in order to to avoid repercussions), it's a case of haves and have-nots. She probably has a point except a conversation can quickly turn into an "us vs. them" situation which isn't the solution either -- especially when I own a Honda Civic.


Source: http://www.bloggingneworleans.com/2007/08/30/draft-held-hostage/