Welcome to yonkers ny someone somehow got into my car and took my gps sirius valentine radar detector and tennis racket and my wallet and 250 bucks after making report with cops i tried starting my car and it would not start i dont no y? after checking car it looks as if they tried going into the area near pedals and ripping into the firewLl and scratching the area up? i called cops back and he thinks it looks tampered with. Anyway after tow truck jimpstarted my battery the car went back on. What happened to my battery in the 20 minutes it took me to get back to my car after i got home and it was broken into. It was parked in front of my house at 5 in the afternoon after coming back from my tennnis club for sneakers for 20 min. No alarm nothing !!!!!!!!!!!!! They must of followed me home!! Maybe i left doors unlocked but then my alarm would be off and car bnattery wouldnt die?

 

This happens every day but as the economy bottoms out, people will get more and more desperate, gotta be careful, lock your car and don't leave valuables in it!

 

Sorry to hear about the attempt on your MINI and what they were able to get away with, fortunately it is very difficult to hot wire a MINI as they are always very low (near the bottom) on the list of vehicles stolen.

Thieves will often take a look at your registration or drivers license (if they get your wallet) to see where you live, especially if they know you are elsewhere.

I'm glad you are OK, any items lost can be replaced. Good luck and safer travels!

 

Sorry to hear about your bad experience. Having a GPS or a radar unit on the dash makes your car an easy target, GPS unit thefts are rampant. If you don't have one already, I would recommend an alarm, and also hiding your GPS and radar detector out of site. Also, you've probably learned this lesson the hard way, but never, ever leave your wallet in your car!

 

Another good reason to have stock Navi, hope they get them

 

Bummer....Back home we have crack heads and tweakers. To combat them I have a very large gun. Of course I dont condone blantant vigilante justice, but theres two sides. victims or heros. Sad but true there are people who steal just because, as it is in Germany my car is under 24 hr survailence (spelling?) w/ night vision. I cant shoot anyone here but I coluld beat someone up. Sad thing was it another Soldier stealin my stuff. End story, he stayed in the hospital for 7 days....You never ever mess with a persons car, property....OR woman. The police complimented me on a job well done..the German police. They had tried tracking this guy down for months, when they found him he was a little worse for wear. He offered no resistance

 

I know how you feel trust me. I had my garmin stolen from my mini and my windows busted out. Even though my garmin was out of sight the mount was all the criminal(s) needed to break my windows out. This is the main reason I went with an indash unit. Less likely to get stolen. Regardless the area I parked the car in was a dump. The glass from my window is still in the parking lot some year and half later (No joke) Im actually thinking about parking my car again there one night and putting a bunch of valuables in it. Then waiting in a friends car for the punks to show up then have a good old fashion brawl.

 

I don't see how a "very large gun" helps if you get back to your car to find your GPS missing. Also, if you shot and killed someone for stealing your GPS, I certainly wouldn't consider you a hero. Perhaps a less extreme approach would be more useful for most owners.

 

Guns are dumb....sorry

 

Thats fine, because I serve... you have the right to think that way. As stated, I dont recommed blazing trails or using them. Sometimes when you live in a bad part of town they help smooth out the travel to the car. If I lived in a bad part of town Id like to have my desert eagle, thats all.
"Guns are dumb".....GYPSY you know they dont have a mind of their own right? Its a piece of metal or plastic incapable of thought or decision

 

Is it possible to short a battery and drain the power.

 

Sorry to hear about your break in. Perhaps having the dealer check your MINI out to make sure that everything is in good working order would be a good idea. They might even do so without charging you. MINI often covers things like this under their Goodwill Program. They did that for me when squirrels munched on my sunroof gasket. (There's a thread about it if you are curious).

I understand how unsettling it is to have someone break into your car at your home. About 10 years ago someone attempted to steal my car stereo in the middle of the afternoon while the car was parked in the garage. I had been detailing my car so it was unlocked. I just went in the house for a couple minutes to get a beverage. The guy only got the removable face as my neighbor saw him in my car and yelled at him and then chased him down the alley. Unfortunately my neighbor didn't catch him but I sure appreciated the effort!

 

Desert Eagle? .50 Cal? If so your gunna do more then just stop them. Your gunna tear a hole in them haha. Unless its the baby Desert Eagle. I wish .50 Cals werent illegal in CA

 

I think we're getting rather off-topic. If you have any practical advice to offer the OP on preventing break-ins, please share it.
As for my rights, it's our government that's been threatening them lately, all in the guise of "protecting" me. A little more feedom and a little less jingoism would better serve our country, in my opinion.

 

todoubled,
this is terrible. Thank goodness they did not get the entire auto. My guess is they messed up the wiring.

 

Sorry to hear that. I am familiar with the scenario, since I live in Mexico City. There are some hood I just plainly avoid at all. I live in a beautiful safe closed neighborhood, but there is a lot of this going on all over the city. How did they break in? I installed on my windows shatter proof film, which will prevent the glass from shattering at impact, it will break but it will not shatter to pieces, making it tougher and more time consuming for the thief to get into the car.

 

That sounds like a great product. Do you know how it differs from regular window tint?

The added anti-theft protection would be another good reason to get your windows tinted.

 

Yes. It looks exactly like window tint. I got the 3M product. You can get it in different shades, from 100% clear to almost black! It installs the exact same way. It is stronger and when the glass is broken, it looks like a spider web, the glass breaks but prevents it from falling all over the place and leaving the hole for the thief to get it!

 

Good Job, HERO!

__
Sorry to hear about your break in. That's a lot to lose too.
I hope your insurance pays out some.

I had my honda broken into a long time ago. Get this, they got the
KEY to it. Yes, I was young and stupid. I had just a key hidden
so I could put it on my shoestring and go jogging. Don't ever do this.
It's a terrible idea. It was two days before I had to go out of
town for reserves duty. Luckily they were not professionals and
couldn't get the radio out, just the key and the walkman.
But since they had the key I had to lay in the bushes under a tarp all
night with a rifle, to make sure they didn't come back for the car.
Nobody came. Darn. Well, that was a long time ago.

I had no idea people will break your window just if they see a GPS mount.

I don't think a downturn in the economy causes crime.
The country has had serious downturns before, and a depression.
Crime wasn't rampant during the depression. People cause crimes.
They are criminals in times of expansions as well as times of
downturns or recessions or depressions. They are criminals from the
inside out not the outside in.

 

npalao: Good call! Where do you get the shatter proof film? I want that stuff like yesterday!

I too know how everyone on this thread feels. We went through a rampant stereo thievery here in town a few years back (yes, a local gang of vicious meth-heads were responsible) and they broke into my car when my husband parked it downtown, across the street from the opera house and the area was crawling with cops due to extremely bad road conditions... and they still smashed in my passenger side window and made off with my stereo.

The real suck part was getting my kids home in the middle of a snow storm with the window blasted out of the car. I was very grateful to my dad that night, for always insisting that I keep an emergency road kit in the trunk of my car. The day I got Viola home (just over a month ago now....), I stuffed a blanket and my snow stick in the boot.

 

Ask around in your local boutiques, I would assume that most that carry the tints would be able to get you the shatter proof ones! I got the mid grey one, to go with my dark silver/black exterior and looks awesome! If not, let me know, I will send you some from down here!

 

Let's not start that argument here? K thanks.

I am just happy I live in Texas for half the year.

 

my renters insurance is gonna cover items in car using off premises theft thank god auto does nothing with electronics

 

And I suppose you think that the police are there to protect you. I purchased car insurance for my Mini and life insurance from Sig Arms for me.

 

Being a clean car freak is also helps prevent crimes. A thief will be looking for any excuse to choose your car over someone elses... a GPS mount on the window means that there might be a GPS unit in the car or in the glovebox. Even having a case full of CDs in plain sight might be the motivation to choose your car over the one next to you.

About 12 years ago a thief broke into 3 of the 4 cars in my driveway (2 belonging to the couple that lived above us and 1 car belonging to my soon-to-be wife). My car, the one with the clean interior and nothing scattered around was the only one undamaged. They broke the lock, wrecked the door and destroyed the stereo in my wife's car ($1200 damage) to eventually steal 10 CDs that she had scattered in the floor. They took the change from the cupholders and some sports equipment from the other 2 cars. My car had $3000 of computer hardware out of sight in the trunk... the only car not to get touched was the only one that had anything worth more than $100 in it!

The idea is to make your car look as uninteresting as is possible... an alarm with a flashing light or announcement stickers, the Club (which I loved when I lived in NY/CT) and an empty interior with no window tint (let 'em see that there is nothing inside worth having) is a great help.