POP Center Problems Carjacking Page 2
Understanding Your Local Problem
The information provided above is a generalized description of carjacking. To better use the information and effectively prevent carjacking in your community, you must combine the general findings of carjacking with a specific understanding of your local stakeholders and your local problem. Analyzing the local problem carefully will help you design a more effective response strategy.
Stakeholders
In addition to criminal justice agencies, the following groups have an interest in the carjacking problem and ought to be considered for the contribution they might make to gathering information about the problem and responding to it:
- Vehicle manufacturers. The design and installation of anti-theft technology can affect carjacking risks.
- Vehicle dealerships. Vehicle dealers have the best opportunity to communicate personally with vehicle buyers about the use of anti-theft technology.
- Insurance companies. Vehicle insurance companies have policies covering at least some losses arising out of a carjacking under comprehensive coverage. Insurance companies and drivers have a financial interest in reducing the risk of carjacking.
Asking the Right Questions
The following are some critical questions you should ask in analyzing your particular problem of carjacking, even if the answers are not always readily available. Your answers to these and other questions will help you choose the most appropriate set of responses later.
Incidents
- How many carjacking incidents have occurred in your jurisdiction? † How many and what proportion are reported to police? How many and what proportion occur, but go unreported?
- Are the number of carjackings increasing or decreasing in recent years?
- How concerned are residents about carjacking? Who appears to be most concerned?
- In what proportion of incidents are offenders identified? Apprehended?
- In what proportion of incidents are vehicles recovered? Are recovered vehicles damaged? Where are they recovered?
- What vehicle makes or models are most likely to be carjacked in your jurisdiction? Does this vary across locations or over time in your jurisdiction?
- What methods are most used to distract and then coerce drivers into giving up their vehicle?
- What type of weapons, if any, are displayed or used? What type of physical force, if any, is used (e.g., punching or kicking, dragging, shoving)?
† In some police agencies, carjackings are lumped in with other robberies in the records system. The Minneapolis Police Department created a new offense code to classify carjacking separately from auto theft or robbery (Bergal, 2020; National Public Radio, 2021).
Offenders
- What is known about offenders’ demographics (e.g., age, gender, race)? Is there anything different in the profile of this group of offenders from offenders in your community, generally?
- Are there prolific offenders in your jurisdiction? Identifying repeat offenders is necessary for focused-deterrence law enforcement, prosecution and incapacitation.[49]
- What are offenders’ motives for carjackings?
- Is a carjacking more likely to be committed by a group of offenders or one offender alone?
Victims
- What physical injuries have occurred to victims?
- Were passengers, including children, abducted? If so, does the abduction appear to have been intentional or unintentional?
- Were any carjacking victims killed?
- Did victims resist the carjacking? If so, how?
- Who is more likely to be victimized in terms of age, gender, and race? Is there anything different in the profile of this group of victims from victims in your community, generally?
- Did the carjacker and victim know one another before the carjacking occurred?
- What circumstances, if any, made victims especially vulnerable (e.g., intoxicated, distracted, parked or driving in a poorly lit area, driving a vehicle type known to be desired by carjackers)?
- Were the carjacking victims alert and aware of carjacking risk and carjacking tactics?
- What proportion of carjacking victims had comprehensive vehicle insurance?
Time and Location
- Where are carjackings occurring in your community (In what areas? Around what types of facilities? On and near what type of roadways?)
- Are carjackings concentrated by hour of day, day of week, or month/season of the year? If so, why might that be?
Measuring Your Effectiveness
Measurement allows you to determine to what degree your efforts have succeeded and suggests how you might modify your responses if they are not producing the intended results.
You should take measures of your problem before you implement responses, to determine how serious the problem is, and after you implement them, to determine whether they have been effective. You should take all measures in both the target area and the surrounding area. For more detailed guidance on measuring effectiveness, see Problem-Solving Tools Guide No. 1, Assessing Responses to Problems: An Introductory Guide for Police Problem-Solvers and Problem-Solving Tools Guide No. 10, Analyzing Crime Displacement and Diffusion.
The following are potentially useful outcome measures of the effectiveness of responses to carjacking. Keep in mind that process measures show the extent to which responses were properly implemented. Outcome measures show the extent to which the responses reduced the level or severity of the problem.
- Reduction in the number of carjacking incidents
- Reduction in the number of victims injured or killed during carjackings
- Reduction in the severity of victim injuries
- Reduction in citizens’ fear of becoming a carjacking victim
- Increase in the number and proportion of carjacked vehicles recovered
- Reduction in the damage caused to carjacked vehicles