"You feel violated. You come out and everything's taken
from your car, and I know that's happened to a lot of people
and you just don't think it's going to happen to you,"
says Rick Mayer, a burglary victim.
Mayer
still can't believe two thieves broke into his car yesterday.
It was parked in a public lot - in broad daylight.
"The
window was down just a crack so I could let the air in, and
you can see the fingerprints where the guy reached around
and he pulled back," he says.
The two
men were tempted by a laptop and other items sitting on the
floor of Mayer's car.
"Had
that laptop been in the trunk, they wouldn't have seen it.
Or had it been covered up in the back seat with some coats,
they wouldn't have seen it. And with Christmas coming on,
with people having presents laying around exposed, people
are just putting themselves at risk," Mayer says.
Police
say more people put themselves at risk this time of year.
Officers say they can't remind people enough to lock their
car doors and hide any valuables in the trunk. They say thieves
will strike at any opportunity.
"They
take advantage of whatever circumstance they run into, so
it can be during the middle of the day, into the evening or
into the early morning hours," says Sgt. Michelle Burnette
with the Sandy City Police Department.
And most
thieves getaway.
Rick Mayer,
though, is lucky. A witness gave police a good description
of the two thieves, and most of his goods were recovered.
Still,
he says it could have all been prevented had he spent a few
extra minutes taking a simple precaution.
"I
used to be in law enforcement, and I know that most times,
these things don't have a happy ending, and this one did."
When police arrested one of the suspects who broke into Mayer's
car, they also found a bag full of other stolen items, including
passports and credit cards.
Officers
say they're now seeing a lot of identity theft, which begins
when thieves steal a form of ID from someone's car.
