Recently, a teen who - at fourteen years of age - caused the death of his 17-year-old passenger when he crashed their stolen car into a bus in Vancouver, is back in trouble for car theft after vowing to turn his life around.

Lots of car thieves are drug addicts; Jason Joy, profiled in Marketplace, was. I suspect lots of car thieves are also FAS (foetal alchohol syndrome) - the teenager recently in trouble again may be. I know that FAS damages the part of the brain that controls cause-and-effect logic, as well as preventing the full development of the excitement and pleasure centres, resulting in thrill seekers who have difficulty understanding and addressing the consequences of their actions.

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Joy: I walk by and here is this beautiful car that no one has probably even seen in Vancouver before. It’s from Idaho.

Johnson: But there are lots of beautiful cars on the street.

Joy: Oh, I know. I honeslty felt victimized here, like I am a victim here.

Johnson: But you stole a car?

Joy: I did steal a car.

Johnson: Why not just walk by? Why are you a victim if you steal the car?

Joy: Because, well that’s how I felt then, now I feel differently. And that’s the only reason I agreed to do this interview was because for some reason it was just meant to be.

After serving five months for stealing the bait car, Joy was released. A week later, he was arrested, breaking into another car.

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I think it's obvious that the "beautiful" car is the real criminal.

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I sneeze on my hand and wipe it all over the door handles, maybe squeeze a few farts on them afterwards too.

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There's nothing I could add to this, other than to ask whether any of your friends know you do this, and whether they'll still shake hands with you, or allow you to enter their homes?

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Mr Magoo: the ladies?

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I thought it was an OK use of the term, like in "ladies' man", that sort of thing.

Actually I was going to say "chicks".

Like drunk drivers, I doubt car thieves set out to hurt anyone. In fact, I bet they are convinced that they won't hurt anyone.

What curbs people from drinking and driving is the thought that, if caught, the fines, legal fees, insurance costs, and equipment costs will make driving cost prohibitive, perhaps for life for many.

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Originally posted by Tommy_Paine:
What curbs people from drinking and driving is the thought that, if caught, the fines, legal fees, insurance costs, and equipment costs will make driving cost prohibitive, perhaps for life for many.

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I would argue that these things will curb people who are social drinkers -- moderate or heavy. For chronic alcoholics, my personal and anecdotal evidence is that they are not effective much at all.

As for chronically compulsive thieves, I wonder if restorative justice would really matter. I wonder if their need for money (perhaps for drugs as was mentioned earlier) would outweigh the risks in their minds.

What has been of some help with drunk drivers is the manditory install of a breathalyzer in the car which must be used to start the vehicle and at predetermined intervals as the car is in use.

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perhaps it would make people think twice?

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Or, if they aren't thinking once (never mind twice), at least it would mean you'd get the value of your car back.

We'd need a system where the government fronts you the replacement cost of the vehicle from a fund, then the thief reimburses the fund. For one, who'd want to wait forever while the thief rolls his quarters, and second, who'd want to maintain any kind of contact whatsoever with the thief, or listen to the "I'll have the money soon" crap?

Drive trains from new trucks can be removed and swapped into bodies of older used trucks and resold, with the buyer and seller both knowing what's going on, and getting a lucrative deal on both ends.

I would agree that there isn't much that's going to reach a chronic alcoholic drunk driver, or car theif, who is probably stealing because its some kind of fetish.

It wasn't until years later that it dawned on me the replacement engine was likely stolen. I had sold the car long before, and it was almost certainly in a wrecking yard by then, so there wasn't much that could be done.

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I've often wondered who buys these stolen goods.

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The same here. CD players are inexpensive and common now but when they first came out they were a hot item for thieves to target. I had one of those pop out ones and sure enough, one of the few times I leave it in the car it gets stolen (and the manual that came with it out of the golve compartment). The policeman advised not getting another one as the thieves can cause a lot of damage breaking into your vehicle to get one, etc. I spoke to one fellow who had had three CD players stolen out of his car.

Maybe I'm naive and assume most folks wouldn't buy stolen CD players. Most folks I know wouldn't even know how to go about buying a stolen CD player. Just naive and innocent I suppose.

[ 11 June 2005: Message edited by: fossilnut ]

I also got a rebuilt transmission to replace the one I thrashed (it took me 15 more years to accept that I couldn't drive a standard)

A long LONG time ago I went in to renew my insurance and was told I couldn't because my truck had been sold in Washington State. I said no, my truck is parked out on your parking lot. Well, we have it in the computer as sold in Washington State. My truck is on your parking lot. Well...so out I went and I got all my paperwork, including registration and diddledump but no, your truck was sold in Washington State and ... I said it obviously was not sold, come with me, I'll show you. AND here are all my papers. Oh they probably stole them, copied them, put yours back and..I said all this for an old Chev pickup truck?

Things began to get heated. I was told there was a "big market" for false car registration and "some people" actually Xerox'ed their paperwork and sold it several times and...and I said well I didn't do that and I'll sign an affidavit and...no we can't insure your truck because your truck was sold in Washington State.

I said fine'en. Be that way. I'm going to go out and get in my non-existant truck, and I'm going to start it up, and then I'm driving it RIGHT THROUGH THAT FUCKIN' WALL and there won't be a thing you can do about it because if it doesn't fuckin' exist it can't possibly do any damage, it's all a figment of my imagination, I must'a rode here on my vacuum cleaner.... got only as far as the door...never got a chance to smash through the wall...I was issued my insurance coverage and went home feeling VERY tough and VERY butch and quite vindicated.

So SOMETHING was sold in Washington State with copies of my registration papers...maybe they stole some pieces from pickup A and some from pickup B and when they had enough pieces they put them together, and headed off with these purported Xerox copies and...

except wouldn't you think they'd be better off with a JOB? The amount of work required to build a ghost pickup...or maybe it's all just a game to them... ha ha see how long it takes'em to figure this one out...

BUT even if the corporations are poisoning our water, land, and air, even if the fish farm industry is polluting the entire coast, even if our federal politicians are all barking mad and playing musical cabinet posts, even if Iraq is rubble and Iran is on the extermination list, FEAR NOT. Chief Jamie Graham is no longer posing in uniform beside or behind the wheel of sports cars to advertise them and he is promising progress on all fronts and the RCMP bait car programme has been expanded so we can watch more fetal alcohol affected youth saying Fuck man, the cops, we're fuckin busted, we are so fuckin' busted, oh god I don't want to be fuckin busted, man....

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Originally posted by Tommy_Paine:
I would agree that there isn't much that's going to reach a chronic alcoholic drunk driver, or car theif, who is probably stealing because its some kind of fetish.

But they are the smaller percentage. Just because we can't deal with them doesn't mean we give the whole thing a pass.

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I think the term you're looking for is compulsion, and not fetish.

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Someone (who?) has suggested that as we get older we get more cynical.

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Maybe I 'm on to this rebuilt stereo scam.

BTW my brother had 3 car stereos stolen from his driveway the same night he had them replaced at the dealer. He figures someone in the dealer (not necessarily the owner) was giving out his address.

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Originally posted by Tommy_Paine:
I'm willing to bet that car stereo kinds of thefts are by young guys who wants one for himself, or a friend.

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