Notice a rise in vehicle burglaries? Manatee cops have, too, and they have a plan

When you step out of the car, shut the door and walk away, do you stop to make sure the doors are locked?

Locked doors can deter vehicle thefts, but local officials are hoping they have created another solution, noting there have been hundreds more reported vehicle burglaries reported this year than in 2017.

In 2018, there have been 650 vehicle burglaries investigated by the sheriff's office, compared to 450 during the same time last year.

To combat the ongoing issue, the Manatee County Sheriff's Office is starting a specialized burglary task force.

The task force will focus on vehicle burglaries and stolen vehicles, as well as residential burglaries, sheriff's office spokesman Dave Bristow said.

Task force members will mostly be made up of the sheriff's office patrol and criminal investigations divisions and school resource officers, who will saturate neighborhoods in the county during overnight hours, looking for active burglaries. The goal is to round up and arrest the perpetrators as well as prevent burglaries altogether.

"I know every time we do (a task force), we end up driving numbers down. It just makes sense, when you saturate an area with law enforcement, you'll drive the numbers down," Bristow said.

There is no one particular area deputies will focus on during patrols. Rather, they will be in as many places as possible across the county.

"We've been just hit hard in so many different areas that we can't really pinpoint (one)," Bristow said.

The timing of the task force's creation is no accident.

"The summer months are traditionally bad for burglaries," Bristow said. "People are on vacation, kids are out of school. We've done these task forces before and they’ve helped."

Wednesday, five vehicles were burglarized and one stolen in Palmetto's Willow Walk subdivision, according to the sheriff's office. Early Thursday, two vehicles were stolen and there were two reported vehicle burglaries in Oakley Place on 36 Court East and two additional vehicle burglaries in Oak Creek on 59th Avenue Circle East in Ellenton.

Surveillance video from Willow Walk shows three to four people walking up to vehicles parked in driveways, checking for unlocked doors.

Bristow said that's not unusual.

"It appears like we have groups of suspects. Sometimes it might be one or two, but like in the video you can see four. They're just going up and down the street," Bristow said.

The larger number of people involved means they can move down the street faster and check more vehicles.

In 2017 there were 414 reported motor vehicle thefts in Manatee County, the majority of which — 315 of them — were handled by the sheriff's office, according to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement uniform crime report for 2017. Last year's number was a slight decrease from 2016, which saw 421 vehicle thefts in the county.

The uniform crime report does not specifically break down to the number of vehicle burglaries. However, it shows there were 195 robbery, 941 burglary and 1,236 larceny reports made to the sheriff's office in 2017.

One of the issues, Bristow said is vehicles being left unlocked. Sometimes the keys are also left inside the vehicle.

"Roughly 94 percent of the time, the vehicle is unlocked. But that makes sense because they're checking all the cars and not going into them if they're locked. Just lock your vehicle," Bristow said.

"It's such a preventable crime," Bristow said.

In addition to the task force, the sheriff's office has been trying to encourage residents to lock up their cars over social media.

On the social media website Nextdoor, a network that looks to connect neighbors in specific communities, sheriff's office officials are reminding users to lock up on a daily basis.

In addition to making sure the doors are locked, Bristow said security or surveillance cameras can help deter burglaries, as well as reporting suspicious activity late at night.

This story was originally published May 31, 2018 at 4:47 PM with the headline "Notice a rise in vehicle burglaries? Manatee cops have, too, and they have a plan."