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12/08/2021 07:45 AMThe holidays bring joy, happiness, and all-around good cheer, but they also bring out the phone scammers, porch pirates, and petty thieves. Guilford Chief of Police Butch Hyatt is making some recommendations for residents to help lessen the odds of being a victim of one of these crimes this season.
According to Hyatt, the first action residents can take is to make sure they lock their cars, keep packages and those presents in your trunk or out of sight. A few simple acts can prevent most petty car crimes that have been reported by almost every shoreline town in recent months.
“We always recommend to people to lock their cars. This crime is not going away and simply locking your vehicle will usually prevent this crime,” said Hyatt. “And please do not leave your keys in your car. They best way to avoid these crimes is simply to make it hard for a criminal.”
Hyatt said Guilford’s number of car break-ins appear to be ebbing, but several other area towns are still experiencing this crime. According to Hyatt, car break-ins tend be cyclical and will periodically rise or fall in most municipalities.
“These crimes are still going on and residents should take care,” Hyatt said.
There have also been several phone scams reported in area towns, including Madison in recent weeks. Some of these scammers are not only purporting to be police looking for bail money, but have “spoofed” actual police phone numbers, making the caller ID seem legitimate.
“The ones that we see quite regularly are the ‘grandparents’ scheme, which is the one where they target seniors and say, ‘Your grandson was involved in a DUI accident and it’s $25,000 to post his bond—can you send us money?’ They pull this scam hoping to confuse the elderly and count on them sending money. Most scams like this have warning signs. No one legitimate is going to call you and ask you to send them money via Visa gift cards or want the money wired to an address. That’s not going to happen legitimately. If that does happen to you, we tell people to get a call back number and then call your local police department and let them know and they will guide you through it,” said Hyatt.
According to government officials, the IRS never contacts taxpayers via phone or email; its correspondence is via USPS mail service only. And local police departments will never contact residents via phone demanding payments with a threat of arrest.
Hyatt has several recommendations for residents to ensure any phone call, regardless of the con it’s attempting to perpetrate, can be identified. The Guilford Police Department also posts alerts on its Facebook page where residents can get timely updates on any issues.
“Always avoid providing information over the phone; don’t provide credit card, bank info, or personal biographical information over the phone. Those are things we tell people not to do. Most police benevolent associations [PBAs] will not contact you over the phone. They will usually send out requests for donations by mail with a letter,” Hyatt said. “Our union PBA does solicit funds, but they do that in a mailing on official letterhead and it will have an address and phone number attached with it that you can call up to confirm. If you do receive something suspicious or you have questions, simply call your local police department and they can run it down and see if it is a scam or something legitimate.”
According to Hyatt, residents should also be vigilant with packages and articles left outside the home. Hyatt said that many of the major shipping companies have put measures in place to mitigate package theft, but some of these criminals are getting crafty and can convincingly imitate actual recognizable company uniforms, making it difficult to discern a person’s identity.
“Thankfully we have not had a lot of those this year, but we do see some around the region, so it pays to be vigilant,” Hyatt said. “People are still trying to commit this type of crime, but some of the delivery companies are trying to do a better job of tracking to avoid items being left too long outside. We’ve seen instances in the region where somehow a person has gotten hold of a UPS or FedEx uniform and so it looks like their legitimate. They simply walk up to a door and grab what’s there and people don’t give it a second thought until they find out it wasn’t an actual employee. We ask people: If you see something, say something. Let us vet it and find out what’s going on.”
According to Hyatt, one other type of crime that appears to increase during the holiday season are brazen store thefts. What was traditionally called shoplifting has escalated in recent years to confrontational and blatant thefts from stores, said Hyatt.
According to published reports, a BJ’s Foods in Wallingford was hit by duo of bold thieves who stole 10 large-screen TVs and allegedly assaulted a store staff member. Oxford and Southington also reported intimidating and confrontational thefts from stores in their communities.
Though that level of crime is rare in towns like Guilford, Hyatt stresses never to confront thieves or try and intercede in these types of acts. Taking photos and remembering details and identifiers is more beneficial for the police to apprehend this type of perpetrator, according to Hyatt.
“This time of year we see a lot more of what we used to call shoplifting, it’s not shoplifting anymore, it’s organized retail theft,” Hyatt said. “I’m sure residents have seen this on TV and the news, where thieves come in and steal so much at any given time. Please don’t try and stop them if you see this. You don’t know if they’re armed or assaultive. The best thing to do is get your phone out—take a picture, take a video, jot down a license plate number. Be a good witness so that when police do show up we’ve got good information to follow up on and share with other departments to help track these guys down. They are bold and brazen now.”
Hyatt also recommends residents to be smart this holiday season and not drink and drive, nor smoke and drive.
“Please use a designated driver this season-really all the time,” said Hyatt. “You are a danger getting behind the wheel when under the influence and it is easier than ever these days to find alternative methods to get a ride. So please think about that during this holiday season.”