Police Lock Your Door For You

[Wormius]

Anecdotal, based on one observed event. One time I saw a guy prowling, and he was checking the doors, they were locked so he just moved onto another car.

I think in order for someone to want to break into your car, the car would either have to be unlocked, have something of value visible from the outside, or be an easy car to steal. Another thing some people don't realize is that there is a valet key that most people never take out of their glove box.

[OutOfTheCube]

Originally Posted by GGG

Kensington, when I lived there we had windows smashed once for a pair of sunglasses and some change.

Also what crappy neighbourhood to you live in that you need to lock your car doors to stop your car from getting stolen.

I just secure everything that is mine -- I lock my house doors and lockers that I put things into as well. I have a garage and still lock my car doors. Why not?

A locked door is a deterrent no matter what. There's a pretty big step between someone just opening a door and someone loudly smashing a window (which draws a lot of attention) and potentially triggering alarms.

And I've never had my car broken into or attempted to be broken into. It's just the smart thing to do to lock it.

EDIT: My sister had an attempted theft on her vehicle one time too. Attempted because... She woke up when she heard them smash the window at night. She called the police and they showed up before they could Hotwire it. Unlocked door and that car was gone and likely trashed.

[speede5]

So, just wondering, will all you pro guys feel the same way when they start doing this to your house? Maybe if they find it unlocked they have a look around first.

I'm a huge supporter of police, have lots of friends who are cops, but they have to follow the rules, and they don't have a right to do this. As a singular event this is nothing to be upset about but in the grand scheme, it's you letting those in authority take one more step towards eroding your basic freedoms.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by OutOfTheCube

I just secure everything that is mine -- I lock my house doors and lockers that I put things into as well. I have a garage and still lock my car doors. Why not?

A locked door is a deterrent no matter what. There's a pretty big step between someone just opening a door and someone loudly smashing a window (which draws a lot of attention) and potentially triggering alarms.

And I've never had my car broken into or attempted to be broken into. It's just the smart thing to do to lock it.

EDIT: My sister had an attempted theft on her vehicle one time too. Attempted because... She woke up when she heard them smash the window at night. She called the police and they showed up before they could Hotwire it. Unlocked door and that car was gone and likely trashed.

I'm not saying my logic is better or worse than yours just that the police shouldn't dictate how I choose to protect my belongings.

If someone just opens my door and rummages through they find nothing so that no longer is a concern for me. For theft I have insurance and someone smashing a window and trying to hotwire it vs someone actually stealing results in the same amount of work on my end to get the car back to working order.

[The Familia]

Originally Posted by RougeUnderoos

The clarion call of the elusive "Urban Sucker"! Rarely heard, but quite distinctive when you do hear it.

Please do explain your clever little quote. Your telling me that if a cop was locking someones door and they stumbled upon a car with illegal weapons and a few hundred thousand dollars worth of cocaine or heroin, you would be ok with them just closing their eyes, walking away and letting the person continue their drug ring?

[jayswin]

Originally Posted by The Familia

Please do explain your clever little quote. Your telling me that if a cop was locking someones door and they stumbled upon a car with illegal weapons and a few hundred thousand dollars worth of cocaine or heroin, you would be ok with them just closing their eyes, walking away and letting the person continue their drug ring?

I Personally would, in the name of due process. Doing or pocessing something illegal is enough to get arrested, but it isn't enough to have police skip due process. It's one of the many things that sperates canada from all the ****ty countries out there.

[jayswin]

Hell even one of the most corrupt police forces in North America found a bunch weed in justin biebers house but announced they wouldn't be acting on that find because it was unrelated to what the got the warrant for (noise and egging neighbours house) and therefore didn't have a right to proceed on charges.

[RougeUnderoos]

Originally Posted by The Familia

Please do explain your clever little quote.

People who truly believe "if you don't have anything to hide, you don't have anything to worry about..." are suckers.

Originally Posted by The Familia

Your telling me that if a cop was locking someones door and they stumbled upon a car with illegal weapons and a few hundred thousand dollars worth of cocaine or heroin, you would be ok with them just closing their eyes, walking away and letting the person continue their drug ring?

Ha ha. Wow. Well you can be rest assured that if a cop just happens to innocently open the door to Tony Montana's car and finds all that stuff, he's not going to close the door and walk away.

[Arya Stark]

Originally Posted by The Familia

Please do explain your clever little quote. Your telling me that if a cop was locking someones door and they stumbled upon a car with illegal weapons and a few hundred thousand dollars worth of cocaine or heroin, you would be ok with them just closing their eyes, walking away and letting the person continue their drug ring?

Wouldn't matter if he did or didn't because the charges wouldn't stick.

[Wormius]

Are the police ran-sacking and rummaging through the cars when they find an unlocked vehicle? If they are not, and anything illegal is in plain sight, why wouldn't the police be able to do something about it?

[Locke]

Its actually interesting that for a place such as Calgary so many people drive crapheap cars. I cant really point fingers because I did too up until just under a year ago and no, I didnt lock it.

If theres piles of cocaine in a car and the police opened the door to check if it was locked and saw it they would have seen it through the windows anyways. If your illegal activities are in plain sight then call Lionel Hutz and see if he can help you make bail.

As for this policy? Its a tough one because the vast majority of people should be locking their cars. Maybe some discretion should have been used.

"Hey Chief, should I lock the doors on this '88 Corolla?"

"Naw Lou, let it go...."

[Nage Waza]

The fact they found 9/200 unlocked means this is not a big problem.

I have a problem with wasting the police's time doing this.

Is there any evidence that locking your car prevents prowlings?

[Arya Stark]

Originally Posted by Wormius

Are the police ran-sacking and rummaging through the cars when they find an unlocked vehicle? If they are not, and anything illegal is in plain sight, why wouldn't the police be able to do something about it?

Because the police can't just go up and look inside vehicles with zero cause and open doors they're not permitted to open. No way they would get a conviction and maybe a criminal lawyer can step in and correct me if I'm wrong.

If the police stopped you for speeding and saw a huge bag of coke on the seats or were doing foot patrol and happened to spot it then yeah, but to specifically go and open a door of a car which they did not have permission to open I highly doubt a conviction would be made.

[jar_e]

Originally Posted by Arya Stark

Because the police can't just go up and look inside vehicles with zero cause and open doors they're not permitted to open. No way they would get a conviction and maybe a criminal lawyer can step in and correct me if I'm wrong.

If the police stopped you for speeding and saw a huge bag of coke on the seats or were doing foot patrol and happened to spot it then yeah, but to specifically go and open a door of a car which they did not have permission to open I highly doubt a conviction would be made.

To clarify, if a cop was walking down the street, saw a bunch of coke/gun/etc. in plain view in a vehicle, there's definite cause and duty for the police to act in something in plain view. Door unlocked or locked is irrelevant if its in plain view.

Opening up doors and going on fishing trips in a veh, obviously a different issue.

That being said, this is all acting in good faith and essentially a push to make police more efficient and reduce crime. The vast, vast, vast majority of car break and enters are done through unlocked doors and damage to vehicles I'd guesstimate is at around 4-7% in Calgary. A large portion of stolen vehicles are stolen through unlocked doors. So doing this preventative work actually reduces police investigating this work and probably further ahead in the long run time/manpower wise.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by jar_e

To clarify, if a cop was walking down the street, saw a bunch of coke/gun/etc. in plain view in a vehicle, there's definite cause and duty for the police to act in something in plain view. Door unlocked or locked is irrelevant if its in plain view.

Opening up doors and going on fishing trips in a veh, obviously a different issue.

That being said, this is all acting in good faith and essentially a push to make police more efficient and reduce crime. The vast, vast, vast majority of car break and enters are done through unlocked doors and damage to vehicles I'd guesstimate is at around 4-7% in Calgary. A large portion of stolen vehicles are stolen through unlocked doors. So doing this preventative work actually reduces police investigating this work and probably further ahead in the long run time/manpower wise.

I would love to see stats on this if you have a link. The car theft ones especially as I don't leave anything of value in my car.

[jar_e]

Originally Posted by GGG

I would love to see stats on this if you have a link. The car theft ones especially as I don't leave anything of value in my car.

I'd have to look tomorrow but I presume they're all internal and not meant for public consumption. It may be buried on the website in the crime stats however. Further though, speaking from my experience, no criminal is driving a stolen vehicle with a broken window. That's a massive red flag obviously if they're driving around with no side window. Maybe beside a joyride, but definitely not in my experience.

[Nage Waza]

Originally Posted by jar_e

I'd have to look tomorrow but I presume they're all internal and not meant for public consumption. It may be buried on the website in the crime stats however. Further though, speaking from my experience, no criminal is driving a stolen vehicle with a broken window. That's a massive red flag obviously if they're driving around with no side window. Maybe beside a joyride, but definitely not in my experience.

So instead of the police sharing these stats, they pay police to check doors to raise awareness?

[jar_e]

Originally Posted by Nage Waza

So instead of the police sharing these stats, they pay police to check doors to raise awareness?

Heaven forbid an organization have internal memos/documents only meant for employees? I have no idea how the OP's police force in the story work. I'm positive if this happened in Calgary that stats would be available upon request or shared at the start of the campaign.

And yeah, paying police to prevent crime is pretty fundamental in law enforcement.

[WhiteTiger]

Originally Posted by jar_e

I have no idea how the OP's police force in the story work.

It was the Police force for North Bay, Ontario.

[DoubleF]

Originally Posted by Wormius

Anecdotal, based on one observed event. One time I saw a guy prowling, and he was checking the doors, they were locked so he just moved onto another car.

I think in order for someone to want to break into your car, the car would either have to be unlocked, have something of value visible from the outside, or be an easy car to steal. Another thing some people don't realize is that there is a valet key that most people never take out of their glove box.

We have parked multiple cars outside for years. One time for the first time in whatever reason, we left a car on our drive way for a few hours unaware that the car was unlocked. Someone went into the car and looked for stuff to steal. Stuff everywhere, door left open. I can sort of see the logic of not locking a car, but not something I would do.

We live in the NW.

On a different note, I believe people in Churchill Manitoba do not lock cars.