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PostAug 05, 2013#2801

If only the criminals were courteous enough to use this thing here.

KSDK - Police stumped by mystery device used in car break-ins

http://www.ksdk.com/news/article/385640 ... -break-ins

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PostAug 05, 2013#2802

Turns out it was 30 cars that were broken into last night at various locations in FP:

http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/metr ... 4b622.html

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PostAug 06, 2013#2803


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PostAug 06, 2013#2804

framer wrote:It happens in Clayton too:


http://clayton-richmondheights.patch.co ... wsRef=true
It also happens a lot at apartment complexes near highways- I know that thieves have repeatedly hit large complexes near highways in places like Maryland Heights, St. Charles, and North County. It also tends to happen at hotels, and not just in the city proper by any means. Opportunity isn't confined to any particular jurisdiction- but it can be found in just about any densely-packed area when people forget to lock their doors and secure their belongings accordingly.

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PostAug 06, 2013#2805

threeonefour wrote:
framer wrote:It happens in Clayton too:


http://clayton-richmondheights.patch.co ... wsRef=true
It also happens a lot at apartment complexes near highways- I know that thieves have repeatedly hit large complexes near highways in places like Maryland Heights, St. Charles, and North County. It also tends to happen at hotels, and not just in the city proper by any means. Opportunity isn't confined to any particular jurisdiction- but it can be found in just about any densely-packed area when people forget to lock their doors and secure their belongings accordingly.
Stop blaming the victim. They're breaking windows to get into cars. And supposedly the gang working Forest Park is just hitting random cars even if nothing is visible.

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PostAug 06, 2013#2806

Maybe it's all an elaborate scam by Metro to encourage people to take MetroLink and the Forest Park Trolley.

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PostAug 06, 2013#2807

Why didn't the local news cover the break-ins in Clayton?

It seems like they only cover these stories if it involves a location within the city.

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PostAug 06, 2013#2808

southsidepride wrote:Why didn't the local news cover the break-ins in Clayton?

It seems like they only cover these stories if it involves a location within the city.
I know Chesterfield Mall had a problem one time with getting repeatedly hit with and I swear KSDK led the news off with it one evening.

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PostAug 06, 2013#2809

I think it is the same group that hit up Locust St. some months ago and their activities have escalated. They could be part of a ring too. I think that as soon as they are caught - even if they are juveniles - they should be charged as adults because of the extensive nature of the crimes.

This is ridiculous.

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PostAug 06, 2013#2810

dweebe wrote:Stop blaming the victim. They're breaking windows to get into cars. And supposedly the gang working Forest Park is just hitting random cars even if nothing is visible.
It's not 'blaming the victim' to suggest it's a good idea to make sure your car doors are locked and your personal items are hidden. Obviously that's of little comfort when thieves are randomly breaking into cars, but it certainly reduces your chances of being a crime victim in most cases.

Unfortunately, there are just enough criminals out there that do this stuff 'just because', not unlike the knockout game. I don't think anyone has any answers for that except to lock the perpetrators up as long as possible.

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PostAug 10, 2013#2811

http://www.slmpd.org/crimestats/CRM0005-C_20130701.pdf

Crime stats through July are online. Year-to-date summary: property crime remains slightly down from 2012 (12,240 vs. 12,528), personal crime remains significantly down from 2012 (2,897 vs. 3,607), murder remains significantly down from 2012 (59 vs. 70). (Murder is included in the personal crime statistics.)

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PostAug 11, 2013#2812

arch city wrote:I think it is the same group that hit up Locust St. some months ago and their activities have escalated. They could be part of a ring too. I think that as soon as they are caught - even if they are juveniles - they should be charged as adults because of the extensive nature of the crimes.

This is ridiculous.
No. As soon as they are caught, they should be made to "disappear".…………..somehow. Just out of curiosity, what do those big honkin catfish in the ol' miss eat? That would take care of so much of this annoying as s***, crap in the city. Been here 21 years myself, and am getting real sick of news story after news story of the same crimes over and over again. I think it absolutely affects and reinforces the perception non-city residents have of the safety and quality of life of the city.
The "kids" that are pulling this stuff are only going to move on to bolder and more serious property and probably bodily crime. Are they ever going to become productive members of society? I'll take my chances of missing out on the person who will cure cancer from the bunch. Ha!

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PostAug 12, 2013#2813

Someone broke into Urban Shark on the 1000 block of Locust downtown last night and stole two road bikes. One of them is a fairly distinctive bike. Raleigh...blue frame with matching fenders,,,brown wrappings on the handlebars and a brown leather seat...59 centimeter frame as I recall...

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PostAug 12, 2013#2814

vollum wrote:Someone broke into Urban Shark on the 1000 block of Locust downtown last night and stole two road bikes. One of them is a fairly distinctive bike. Raleigh...blue frame with matching fenders,,,brown wrappings on the handlebars and a brown leather seat...59 centimeter frame as I recall...
Prime suspect:


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PostAug 13, 2013#2815

qcarbon wrote:
arch city wrote:I think it is the same group that hit up Locust St. some months ago and their activities have escalated. They could be part of a ring too. I think that as soon as they are caught - even if they are juveniles - they should be charged as adults because of the extensive nature of the crimes.

This is ridiculous.
No. As soon as they are caught, they should be made to "disappear".…………..somehow. Just out of curiosity, what do those big honkin catfish in the ol' miss eat? That would take care of so much of this annoying as s***, crap in the city. Been here 21 years myself, and am getting real sick of news story after news story of the same crimes over and over again. I think it absolutely affects and reinforces the perception non-city residents have of the safety and quality of life of the city.
The "kids" that are pulling this stuff are only going to move on to bolder and more serious property and probably bodily crime. Are they ever going to become productive members of society? I'll take my chances of missing out on the person who will cure cancer from the bunch. Ha!
I feel guilty about the way I feel about these criminals, but I don't think it's too much to have such little regard for people who have such little regard for humanity. These lowlifes just sicken me.

I am interested in the response that I see more and more lately, and I am encouraged that the mayor seems more engaged and there seems to be some tactical progress toward catching repeat criminals that move through the revolving doors of our city's broken justice system only to perpetrate more brazen crimes against people. It seemed like the ATF's work in the city earlier this year did us some good. But what can be done to make sustainable progress? It seems like every day there are stories about violent crime, mass break-ins, etc., and more often than not, repeat offenders are to blame. The police can shift tactics, and the mayor can clamor for justice system reform, but hopefully this talk and the early signs of progress will lead to a measurable and sustainable reduction of crime in the city.

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PostAug 17, 2013#2816

I'm in Destin for a wedding and went to the outlet mall when it started raining. While the gals were hitting their stores I went to Samsonite. The guy behind the counter asked where I was from. When I said St Louis, he said, "What do you do there, I hear there is a lot of crime."

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PostAug 17, 2013#2817

gary kreie wrote:I'm in Destin for a wedding and went to the outlet mall when it started raining. While the gals were hitting their stores I went to Samsonite. The guy behind the counter asked where I was from. When I said St Louis, he said, "What do you do there, I hear there is a lot of crime."
After which Gary went on a ten minute explanation of how Saint Louis really isn't more dangerous than any other major metropolitan area and in fact if you look at the entire MSA the crime rate is actually on the low end. When Gary finished, the clerk politely said, "That'll be $58.65. Cash or credit?"

PostAug 17, 2013#2818

From this article on how the Census may be radically overestimating population growth in cities once again, I was intrigued by Indianapolis' Center Township:

Or look at Indianapolis. In its urban core area, Center Township (township data is reported in a similar manner to municipal estimates in some areas), the population declined by almost 25,000 people during the 2000s, a steep 14.5% loss that was worse than Buffalo and St. Louis and nearly as bad as Cleveland. Center Township has lost population every decade since 1950. Yet the Census Bureau has estimated that it gained 2,300 people since the census.

http://www.newgeography.com/content/003 ... ing-fiasco

This is what I'd love to see for every major city.... the establishment of center reporting areas of roughly equal size -- 40-50 sq. miles or whatever -- that might make apples-to-apples reporting on crime, population trends, etc. possible.

Here is Center Township on WIki:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_Tow ... y,_Indiana

It's about 42 sq. miles with a 2010 population of 142,000 with a peak of 337,000 in 1950. Similarly situate that in Saint Louis, and probably the fairest thing to do is essentially create an east-west oriented triangle and eliminate equal portions of north and south city. There obviously is no perfect solution, but this would be helpful. The other helpful reporting idea to bring consistency would be to what is being proposed here.... look at each city in combination with its surrounding county. Saint Louis and Baltimore in particular would benefit greatly from this.

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PostAug 17, 2013#2819

I've always found crime mapping software that shows crime within a particular radius of a location to be helpful when examining the potential for location-based victimization. I would like to see crime mapping that provides crimes within walking time distances and driving time distances.

In other words, combine this http://www.freemaptools.com/how-far-can-i-travel.htm with SLMPD crime mapping or other websites.

That being said, many crimes don't correlate well with location alone versus other factors such as victim occupation, time of day, proximity to particular building types or forms, etc. Very few crimes are "random" in the literal sense of the word.

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PostAug 17, 2013#2820

roger wyoming II wrote:
gary kreie wrote:I'm in Destin for a wedding and went to the outlet mall when it started raining. While the gals were hitting their stores I went to Samsonite. The guy behind the counter asked where I was from. When I said St Louis, he said, "What do you do there, I hear there is a lot of crime."
After which Gary went on a ten minute explanation of how Saint Louis really isn't more dangerous than any other major metropolitan area and in fact if you look at the entire MSA the crime rate is actually on the low end. When Gary finished, the clerk politely said, "That'll be $58.65. Cash or credit?"
Ok, that was pretty close but the guy was spared the long version because my wife showed up. The place we are staying is actually closer to Panama City and we flew into their new airport. I couldn't help checking metro crime rankings and saw that Panama City metro ranks about 7 slots worse for crime than St. Louis metro. But they are known for beaches, (it is raining today), not crime.

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PostAug 17, 2013#2821

Up in Olympia, most people I talked to about St. Louis never even thought of St. Louis as a dangerous city. The same people also say they moved to Oly from Seattle because it isn't the safest city to raise children...So, basically, they believe STL to be safe but Seattle to be dangerous, somewhat opposite of what people who aren't from Missouri or Washington often think about those two cities.

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PostAug 23, 2013#2822

Heard from a friend that had his car broken into last night.
11 cars were broken into at Malone's on Watson Rd. in Crestwood last night. Smashed out windows and pulled it all off in less than 5 min.

What is St. Louis City and County doing to prevent this? It seems like a very popular crime these days. I'd like to see more bait cars, with computers and phones, with built in GPS tracking devices. I know this might be expensive, but so are these crimes to the victims.

Anyone have a clue what the Police are doing to curb this? Especially Downtown & in Forest Park....

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PostAug 23, 2013#2823

Regarding car clouting...

Cops would say they need more officers to combat car break-ins. That's always their answer. Politicians usually fall blindly into lock step with the cops.

The counter point being, "We don't have enough officers" to do ______________.

The cops always want more cops. They never have enough.

We the people pay for it. And it's already consuming about 1/3 of the city budget. (Thank god they finally gave us local control... :roll: )

Here's a thought: how about more lighting in parking areas and stepped up video surveillance?

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PostAug 23, 2013#2824

I like more surveillance, but what if the car is stolen and hoodies, hats and dark of night make ID'ing them difficult? That is usually the case.

I like the idea of GPS tracking devices in bait cars. Put them in areas that are hit regularly. Hopefully, this will lead to the ring and ring-leaders. I'd assume several groups are perp'ing these crimes, but hopefully the pros will get caught, as well as the amateurs.

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PostAug 23, 2013#2825

What are the thieves stealing that make this such a lucrative venture? Who leaves valuables in a car anymore?

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