RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) — The uptick in car thefts from 2023 is continuing into 2024 for Richmond — and to no one’s surprise, police say Kias and Hyundais continue to be the main targets.
According to the Richmond Police Department, between Sunday, Jan. 14 and Friday, Jan. 19, where were 33 reported car thefts in Richmond. Alex Falls told 8News his car was nearly the 34th.
On the night of Sunday, Jan. 14, someone tried to take off with Falls’ blue Hyundai, which was parked in his driveway in Southside.
“I came out the next morning around 8:30, 9:00 to walk the dog, saw that the [car’s] lights were on and upon closer inspection, saw the broken glass on the ground.” said Falls. “[I] looked in the car and saw the ignition had been completely taken apart, just basically disassembled.”
In 2023, there were over 1,500 motor vehicle thefts in the city, 800 of the vehicles stolen were either Kias or Hyundais. Those two brands being targeted in particular is due to a viral trend on Tiktok which shows people how to override the driving system on certain models.
However, Falls’ model is an older one, so it didn’t work.
“I tried to turn the key, but the key wouldn’t even go in the ignition,” said Falls. “So, whoever tried to steal the car got either very frustrated or worked very hard.”
Lt. Warren Andorfer of Richmond Police says the city is on the same trajectory for vehicle theft numbers this year as it was in 2023.
“It seems like there’s groups going through areas and they’re targeting vehicles and grabbing what they can, and then they move to a different location,” said Andorfer.
Richmond Police is reminding drivers to lock their doors, keep valuable items out of sight and put some sort of tracker in the car.
“Something as simple as dropping an air-tag into your car will be able to make it a trackable vehicle, so that we can recover that vehicle much more quickly and we can identify all their vehicle information if they have that available,” said Andorfer. “That kind of makes things a little quicker.”
Steering wheel locks are also available for free in all four precincts to Richmond residents who own Hyundai or Kia vehicles.
