A spree of car break-ins across College Station last weekend has the College Station Police Department (CSPD) urging residents to lock and protect their cars.
Mark Langwell, public information officer for CSPD, said with the new semester beginning, there are more students with cars.
“When they were home for Christmas some were not used to locking their stuff up,” he said.
CSPD Sgt. Gary Vick said more than 10 break-ins occurred in different parts of the city.
Areas where the break-ins occurred ranged from the Castlegate Subdivision to the Woodstone Shopping Center and Balcones fourplexes.
“That tells you that there is more than one person or group doing it,” Langwell said
Langwell said the cars were parked at houses and apartments.Vick said there was no specific pattern for the break-ins.
“From what I have seen, entry was just by breaking the window,” Vick said.
Sgt. Allan Baron of the University Police Department (UPD) said the A&M campus has not seen a problem with break-ins, but that does not mean cars on campus are not at risk.
Baron said 89 cars were broken into on campus last year, which is roughly seven a month.
“That number is relatively low compared to the number in College Station,” he said.
Baron said UPD patrols several parking lots on campus with a number of officers on foot or on bicycle.
Cameras installed by Transportation Services last year aid UPD in monitoring particular lots, he said.
“By building a surveillance, it says ‘watch out at TAMU, there are cops everywhere,'” he said.
Kerry Stout, a recent A&M graduate, said he caught a person breaking into his car after a night out last semester.
“Me and girlfriend were coming back from Northgate and we were parked at the Catholic church parking lot in the first spot,” he said. “The driver’s side door was wide open and we heard an alarm going off, and I was like ‘that sounds like mine,’ I then saw the guy hanging out of my door.”Stout said he chased him all the way to McDonald’s on University where he was caught by the police.
Stout said nothing was taken.
“He chose the wrong truck to break into,” he said.
Both CSPD and UPD police departments warn students and residents not to leave valuable items, such as purses, cell phones and CDs in visible view.
If car stereos have a detachable cover, CSPD and UPD advise that it be taken off.
Baron said just because the number of break-ins are low on campus, that does not mean students should not take action when at school or at home.
“Things can change overnight,” he said.