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Wireless, GPS-Loaded 'Bait Car' Traps Thieves
captainClassLoader writes: "The Washington Post is reporting that a late-model car, loaded with wireless surveillance gear, a remote kill switch and GPS, is being left (unlocked, presumably) on the streets of the Washington, D.C. metro area as 'bait' for car thieves. This article reports that they've just made their first bust with the vehicle."
They've had that here (Hamilton, Ontario) for a while... they leave them in movie theater parking lots.
Entrapment is where police are getting someone to commit a crime where they would not normally commit one. In this case, they just leave a car in a parking lot (locked or unlocked) and wait for someone to come by and steal it. Since they are not making th vehicle more enticing to thieves or not so regular passersby(by leaving the car on or something) it's not entrapment
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There's much worse than that in Death Wish. Bronson walks around with a camera hanging from his shoulder, the target (a pickpocketer) runs from behind him, grabs the camera and keeps running in front of him. Then he gets his BIG GUN and shoots the guy DEAD IN THE BACK! How's that for punishment fitting the crime? I was expecting him to shoot his leg. Note, this is not just "shown", this is ADVERTISED AS THE RIGHT AND HEROIC THING TO DO!
The bait described in the article, on the other hand, is 100% correct and clean. I wish "real" cars had that too.
Minneapolis and a few other cities have had a similar program running very sucessfully here over the last 5 years. I believe a couple of the people who were busted even tried to use the entrapment defense, which was summarily shot down in the courts since no one made them steal the car, or even gave them the idea to.
In France, they developed something like that for the consumer. Basically you pay a certain fee every year and they install a redundant system on your car (there are +20 different places they can put the system on... limits the chances of getting it removed by know-it-all thieves).
The best part is that they have made a deal with auto insurance companies, so that you don't pay the deductible on auto theft.
It has been in Paris for a little while already.
Artaxerxes
Actually, in most case it is---you've intentionally taken the possessions of another person for your own use. In most US jurisdictiosn that is the definition of "theft". Not that anyone will set up roadblocks to catch you...
Also, if somehow the original owner tracks you down, even if the police don't consider it a crime, you can still be sued for "conversion", which is the act of taking another persons property for your own use (essentially, it's a fancy way of saying "theft", except that it implies no malicious wrongdoing).
"Entrapment is where the government plants the seed of a crime in the mind of individual who would not otherwise be criminally inclined,"
So lets do a little review:
1) They are using a car from the most stolen list.
2) The electronics are OBVIOUSLY not visible.
3) It is doctored with trash, etc. To make it look normal to the area.
So Joe Blow is walking through the parking lot, and thinks to himself...DAMN! That looks like one regular car! Now, I'm not one who would ever think of stealing a car.... I mean the keys aren't even left in the ignition, but I just can't help myself. The seeds are planted....can't control self...MUST....STEAL...CAR!
Yep, must be entrapment.
It's not a GPS-based system. It doesn't even use the cell phone network, relying on its own infrastructure. It's based on car units and direction-finding receivers in police cars. Each car unit has a transmitter and receiver, but doesn't normally transmit. The unit constantly listens for a message on an FM broadcast station subcarrier. On receipt of the proper message, the unit starts transmitting the "I'm stolen" signal, which is received by receivers in police cars. The signal doesn't contain any positional information; somebody has to do the direction-finding job the hard way.
Lojack covers major metropolitan areas in about a dozen states. It requires cooperation from the local cops, so it takes a major marketing and negotiation effort to get it into a city.
Car rental places in South Africa are even offering the option of renting cars with or without the flamethrowers installed.
The Minneapolis / St. Paul Police departments have been using this for at least two years. Wireless kill switch and viedo included. They flip a switch the car dies the doors lock and the lights start going nuts. Surround the car and BUSTED... But seriously nothing new to see here.
It explicity explains why this is NOT entrapment!
I wonder if this technology would be extended to the private consumer level?
Um, isn't this called Lojack?
All Mercedes models with the Tele Aid system (Similar to On*Star) installed have GPS hardware. You have to subscribe to have it activated, though. Once subscribed, you can call Mercedes and ask them to locate your car for you at any time for any reason (where's my wife?). As long as the car is on and visible to GPS, they can give you an approximate location. Location requests remain active for up to 14 days if they don't locate the car immediately. Location isn't really what Tele Aid is for, though.
Instead, Mercedes also promotes the LoJack Locator system. LoJack apparently has a better signal strength and doesn't rely on GPS, but rather on cellular triangulation. Many police departments have cars equipped with LoJack tracking systems as well. There's no subscription fee, just the purchase of the unit itself (around $600) which is covered for the life of the car. The only drawback is that you have to be in a covered area for it to work, so if the thief is smart and can get to the desert before you call the cops, you might be out of luck.
According to LoJack's website, approximately 25% of their recoveries result in an arrest. You also typically get a pretty good break on insurance, so the costs are somewhat offset.
The Mercedes Tele Aid system is designed primarily for driver convenience (Where am I? Where's my car? Can you tell me how to get to the nearest dealer/restaurant/gas station) while LoJack's sole purpose is post-theft vehicle recovery.
I suspect that the DC bait car is using something similar to LoJack - I believe there's an FCC band dedicated to law enforcement recovery type things.
Wow... I sounded like a commercial there, didn't I? I will say that LoJack does provide peace of mind and I was much more willing to spend $600 on it than $240/year for Tele Aid. It takes a darn good product for me to provide a recommendation - but if you've got a high-end or high-theft-risk car, LoJack is definitely worth the money.
Slashdot comments... splitting hairs since 1997.
Also a great feature of new Mercedes is the axle locking. I had an SLK320 (Read my journal to find out what happened, if you feel so inclined) that had this feature. It basically made it have to get lifted up to be towed or moved, which was just a cool feature for the sheer "Yeah try to tow my car" value.
LoJack is a decent system, but you get no added benefit over the standard GPS locator except it's hidden in one of 27 I think) spots. Tele-Aid is awesome though, and you should have gotten the first year free. If not, go bitch at your dealer.
The funny thing about it, nobody steals Mercedes. Those that do, LoJack isn't going to do shit or they stole it just to trash it and it doesn't matter.
There are very very very good reasons as to why civics and camry's are so widely stolen. They are easy to chop, high resale on parts because everyone has one of the cars just about. Mercedes/Ferrari/BMW/etc are not high-theft-risk cars. They say you should get LoJack so they get money, go read the reports.. you'll never see Mercedes on the top 10.
Dacels Jewelers can't be trusted.
But, quick response time isn't always required. My insurance agent told me that LoJack has changed the way that professional car thieves work. They will now steal a car and park it in a public place for 24-48 hours. If it is still there after that time, they presume that there is no LoJack that will lead the police back to their chop shop.
So, It's not perfect, but I decided it was worth a the small additional cost (amortized over the lifetime of my car).
Popular "mass market" cars are often stolen because the parts are easy to get rid of. There are millions of people with cars that can use the parts. There are also lots of unscrupulous people who will buy an engine or a transmission or wheels or seats from a stolen car, not caring that they are supporting auto thievery.
A rare car which is stolen would be of little use, since the only places that service those cars are specialty shops and dealers. Neither those businesses nor their customers would be inclined to get involved in illegal activity such as receiving stolen parts.
The only exception to this would be cars which are stolen "to order". Perhaps a mob boss wants a new Bentley, but doesn't want to go to a dealer and buy it. He could hire someone to steal it for him and then pay him in dirty unlaundered money. He would of course need his own mechanic who can repair the car for him, since he would be unable to take a stolen car to a dealer for service. So this scenario isn't very likely.
Cars aren't stolen randomly, they are stolen for a profit. The only cases of random car theft would be for joyrides, and because of the risk involved for no financial gain, most criminals wouldn't be inclined to do it.
Cryptnotic
My other first post is car post.