The Theft of Metals

A number of years ago, I had an aluminum front door that was broken. I had intended to fix it eventually, but never seemed to get to the task. One day I actually went to look at it more closely so that I could get the parts and the door was gone. The price of aluminum had been high and someone simply took the door! I dislike it when anyone starts off with a justification of something like "It was partially my fault because....." Such conduct by a thief would be expected, but we should not take on the blame for social problems.

Once I was offered a position in a small village in Japan. In the letter it actually stated that I could expect "absolutely no crime" and that if you left something valuable out on the porch for example, someone might pick it up and place it inside the house if possible to keep it out of any possible rain, but never would they take anything. While I am certain this is not the case in every part of any country it was really impressive that they felt compelled to put this into a letter.

As our economy gets tougher and tougher, we may find ourselves in a situation where much more of our "things" are taken. My son has a small lawn business now and now has cut lawns at two vacant locations where the air conditioners have had the copper removed. This kind of theft can be extremely costly to a homeowner or a realtor. The amount of money that a person gets from such a theft is small in comparison to the cost to repair the damage. Air conditioners must have a way to vent the air, so they become a bit more vulnerable. Thieves can sometimes work more efficiently right out in the open during the day. If you saw someone removing a door during the day you would more likely think it was for the purpose of repair than for theft.

Communities can form "watch groups" and your local police department will be more than happy to discuss how such groups could be started in your area. You can ask for extra patrols for some time and you can use a lot of the new technology to help in ending such thefts. One time someone stole the radiator right out of my car and I was not the only one on the block that had this problem.

Over 50 years ago now, my father was in New York City, he had parked the car on the street and was in the building for about 2 hours, when he came out he tried to start the car and nothing happened. He opened the hood and when he looked under the hood the entire engine was gone. When the police came they told him that a group of thieves simply backs up to your car and can remove the engine in as little as 5 minutes. Theft has been around ever since humans have been on the Earth, but we finally do have methods of catching thieves.

It is not your "fault" that there are individuals that will do these types of things, but there are things we can now do to help stop the problem and in the process we may be able to reduce insurance costs and maybe even save some lives in the process.