Hi all,
Beware of new sheme being used to hijack your car!!
A friend went to a public car park to pick up her car, when looking in the rear window there was a sticker on the window. But! because a friend had told her not to stop until she got home she didn't. The sticker was a petrel reciept. Then the local police notified people saying not to stop if anythink has been stuck on your cars rear window.
What do you do! Open your car, start your car, put it into reverse, Check you mirrow, see the obstruction in the back window, put the car into nutral and unlock your car, jump out to remove the obstruction, then the carjackers appear from nowhere and steal your car, practically mow you down. ladies I bet your handbag would still be in the car? with your address, keys, credit cards, Money and a lot of other personal belongings. Now you whole identity is now compromised. So if you see an obstruction in your back window wait until you get home to remove it.

Denese

That seems to be another urban legend that's doing the rounds again.

There are probably easier ways to steal a car, if you keep an eye out.  In the last 2 weeks:

I found a car in the Ikea car park with it's back door open, wide open.
I watched a woman walk into the kiosk to pay for petrol having left her car keys on the front drivers seat
An elderly, and fast asleep, Irish Setter guarding a car and shopping bags with both front windows half open
A set of car keys in an otherwise empty shopping trolley - I still can't work out how they managed that one ?!

I've noticed people with an amazing lack of awareness for their surroundings, hazards and pitfalls.  (Why do people walk backwards for instance?)  Urban myth or no, at least it might make people think twice - check your car when you get back to it, and before you leave...

Hi Jeangenie,
In the midlands they lay rolling in the road waiting for you to stop while others wait on the pavment and hijack your car.
Half a mile away they dragged a women out of her car at the traffic lights in the middle of the day and high jacked her car left her on the pavement in a dreadfull state. I always drive round them, if I thought they were hurt I still would not stop just phone the police when I got home. As you can't use a mobile while driving.

Denese

I have heard of these too Denese, and i feel much the same, its a sad state of affairs but as lone drivers we have to be so careful, and of course more especially if we have children in the back.

But the story of your friend is almost exactly the same as the one on the link JG gave, even down to the same choice of words.  Are you saying your friend really told you this?

I'm amazed that people feel vulnerable in their own cars....it's potentially the most lethal weapon you could have. With the doors locked it is virtually inpenetrable, it moves quicker than most assailants and if all else fails...run them down and put it into reverse and back over them. What's the problem :-)

> I'm amazed that people feel vulnerable in their own cars....

Perhaps because they tell each other stories like this :-)  I agree, be sensible but don't go through life in terror because for someone to take you on in a car is more foolharding on their part that you going out and about freely.

The people who make up these lies in the first place are cyber terrorists. They rely on the caring natures of other people to spread their evil. The sooner the lies are stopped, the better.

well surely you would notice the sticker on your back widow when you opened your boot to put in your shoping?

What if you don't open the boot? :) I do know of factual stories over the years of a person down in the road, and the driver stopping, and the car being stolen. Its an old trick.

Thing is, not to be scared but we all do need to keep our wits about us when out. More especially now with the credit crunch. I can see handbag snatches happening more often, and theft of fuel from vehicles is rising, along with home supplies of oil. So anything of value is there to be taken, car thefts are so easy with a lone person (male or female) once the car door is open. And, as has been said, thefts from cars left unlocked in fuel stations whilst the owner pays.

Oh please dont go down this route again.

Great Britain is a safe place to live if you compare it with almost every other. Try living in Kingston Jamaica, Chicago, Cape Town, Kampala, Beirut or hundreds of others I could add.
Please keep this in perspective and realise this is the 21st century and we are all very lucky to live in this 'Green and Pleasant Land'.

If you woke up tomorrow in Baghdad or Darfur more than likely you'd beg to come back to good old GB.....Bag snatchers or not :-)

I never leave my car unlocked.  Central locking does annoy me though as the doors of my van will only close when I have my keys in the ignition by then I could have someone in the back and another person sat next to me!

I wonder what pillock thought it was a good idea that when you unlock the drivers door that every other door in your vehicle is unlocked too?

Oh please dont go down this route again.
What route? Is being aware of who is around you, where your purse is, securing your car, locking your house up....what is wrong with this? Simple Crime security advice, surely. If you don't believe that crime exists, fine, but don't expect others to feel the same way.

Please keep this in perspective and realise this is the 21st century and we are all very lucky to live in this 'Green and Pleasant Land

I am.........dismissive as your comment is. :(

Unfortunately it isn't a lie that people lay in the road waiting for you to stop. This has happened to my OH while driving home from work one morning. Luckily he drove around the person and didn't stop, cos the bloke got up and walked away!

I have mentioned this on another similar thread a while ago.

I think we do have to be vigilant about crime, there is so much of it aboutand it is on the increase. But we do have to put it in perspective and not be afraid to go about our everyday lives living in fear. Sometimes we are able to keep ourselves safe and sadly sometimes we can't. All we can do is be aware and try not to put ourselves in dangerous situations.

If he didn't stop how does he know the man's intention.  To be honest lying down in the road sounds more like a suicide attempt that a robbery to me.  Would you risk it to rob someone when you don't even know if the driver is some enormous bruiser or their driving skills in avoiding you?

Stupid way to commit suicide when the driver will just drive around you!.He didn't just jump out in front of him. If it was a suicide attempt he would have been better off jumping in front of a train - East Croydon was only 1 min away - and there has been enough suicides there!

I think we do have to be vigilant about crime, there is so much of it aboutand it is on the increase. But we do have to put it in perspective and not be afraid to go about our everyday lives living in fear. Sometimes we are able to keep ourselves safe and sadly sometimes we can't. All we can do is be aware and try not to put ourselves in dangerous situations.

exactly.

>Stupid way to commit suicide when the driver will just drive around you!.

Sorry, I think I edited mine after you wrote this but I do think they would be taking an enormous risk and all for the sake of an unknown driver and car that could be an old banger worth a pittance. One for the Darwin Awards I think :-)  I'm not saying it could never happen but a pretty rare breed I would think :-)

Stupid way to commit suicide when the driver will just drive around you!

Certainly. More likely to be injured but not killed. proving what he intended to do would be difficult, but its so strange he could well have been up to no good, could have had a friend nearby to assist in the crime, or could have been someone of 'unsound mind' who could have attacked regardless of the size of your OH.

>its so strange he could well have been up to no good

A bit like the set-up accidents to claim insurance payouts, perhaps?

Enormously risky I would have thought.  If a car hits you when you are lying down, the mate you have on standby better be a good paramedic! 

Sad that it has come to the state where we have to question whether someone is really in need of help or is in fact up to no good! And really awful for the people who really are in need and who we may choose to ignore for our own safety. A case of weighing up the pros and cons ( or risk assessment :) ) methinks.

I really don't think this is the "state" of things.  If this was a common occurance injuries would be occuring commonly and I think we would all be seeing it in our local press if not nationally.  The only thing that seems to be common are these scams as described in the link JG gave.

I don't mean this particular case, I mean in general. For example Worrying about whether to help catch a mugger or stopping someone beating someone up ( have they a knife?) etc

I don't think I would worry about that choice, I'm really not up to tackling muggers and thugs :-)  The advise they give young people about knife crime is get as much distance between you and anyone you think has one ie get out of there!  Then you could alert the police or whatever.

> I'm really not up to tackling muggers and thugs :-)

Me neither :-D

> What route? Is being aware of who is around you, where your purse is, securing your car, locking your house up....what is wrong with this?

Rather tetchy reply if I may say so but I was refering to threads containing well known urban myths or as JG called them "Cyber Terrorism".
Of course I know that crime exists.. I'm a university lecturer in Forensic Science - but that is real crime not senstionalism and scare-mongering.
I am very well aware of the need to keep things in perspective.
I'm quite frankly sick to death of emails and the like trying to inform me that I am in imminent peril.
By the way....if my purse does go missing   .... it's at least 100 times more likely that I've been stupid enough to lose it, not had it stolen.

Rather tetchy reply if I may say so
you may, it is your opinion, and my comment stands as this is mine.

You may well be a university lecturer in Forensic Science, but this is hardly grass roots every day police work, and by chosing to ignore advice given by the crime prevention unit, even challenging its worth, is hardly useful.

I can't control your emails, if you don't like their content...bin them :)

If your purse goes missing, like countless others you may well have lost it, but this does not mean theft of purse, handbag etc is not going to happen, it happens a lot in the run up to Xmas for example, and more likely now because of the financial crisis of this country. Simple keeping yourself aware whilst out, watching no one is peering over your shoulder whilst using credit/debit cards, not carrying vast sums of cash and taking precautions if you have to, locking your car, keeping valubles out of sight, to name a few things, all common sense and as advised by Police and banks....this is hardly scaremongering, simple common sense.

> Simple keeping yourself aware whilst out, watching no one is peering over your shoulder whilst using credit/debit cards, not carrying vast sums of cash and taking precautions if you have to, locking your car, keeping valubles out of sight, to name a few things, all common sense and as advised by Police and banks....this is hardly scaremongering, simple common sense.

Quite agree but we do have to remember that certain areas are far more likely to have a lot of regular crime take place than others. Mine seems to be one of them :(  In the local rag, it even stated that we have had 7 dogs seized under the DDA just this year - nearly 1 a month! We are the largest London borough though!

> Simple keeping yourself aware whilst out, watching no one is peering over your shoulder whilst using credit/debit cards, not carrying vast sums of cash and taking precautions if you have to, locking your car, keeping valubles out of sight, to name a few things, all common sense and as advised by Police and banks.

What has this stuff got to do with my reply to the OP?....Quoting reams of common sense,in well established, everyday matters, has little to do with what I was talking about ...namely..

Beware of new sheme being used to hijack your car!!

Just for your information......Forensic science is very much everyday Police work......  what did you think it was? A TV programme?

>I can't control your emails, if you don't like their content...bin them

Rather than post them on a forum to spread fear, you mean?

This 'new scheme' that denese received and posted in all innocence has been doing the rounds of emails since 2004, and it seems that no actual crime like this has ever been reported to the police, worldwide.

> by chosing to ignore advice given by the crime prevention unit, even challenging its worth, is hardly useful.

I like an intelligent, well reasoned debate as much as the next person but I think I will op out of something that has lost it's focus, is quoting things I've not actually said and giving facts that are unlikely to be substantiated.
If you can find a link to a "crime prevention unit" that has put out a warning to be aware of this " New scheme to hijack your car" I would love to read it.

Bye

Me too!

Just for your information......Forensic science is very much everyday Police work......  what did you think it was? A TV programme?

LOL...hardly. But then I didnt actually say that.

You compare this country to others that have massive problems, yet make out we don't have any, or very few, when in fact thats not really the case. What has that to do with the original thread? Some people simply fail to admit there is a substantual crime problem in this country, it may not be anything like other countries of great unrest, but we still have them where people are being killed and badly injured. So really, I was following your comments, if that varied from the original thread, then well we both have.

Rather than post them on a forum to spread fear, you mean?

If the OP thought they were genuine, why slate her? Well, your not, but it could have been real. It does lead the somments of things that happen which are strange, and a need to be aware of those round us and that sort of thing.

>If the OP thought they were genuine, why slate her? Well, your not,

Thank you for acknowledging that I've said nothing to 'slate' denese - quite the opposite.

>but it could have been real.

If it had been real it wouldn't have been listed on Snopes as being false. When anyone receives such emails it's always worth checking (it only takes a few seconds of googling) to find out if something's been posted before, and then one knows whether or not it should be posted further.

I'm not disagreeing with you, trouble is not everyone knows about snoopes...unless I'm on my own here lol, coz I hadn't until someone here mentioned it a while ago. Just saying that Denise thought it was true, and was helping out by posting....just as easily as I could have (well, must be minority here too coz I don't get these emails, but then I only email friends and family).

tooolz

> run them down and put it into reverse and back over them. What's the problem

With you all the way :-D  (slight downside for us with higher road clearance but I guess if we reverse at an angle .... - sorted LOL )

Teri,
You are naughty :-)

My car has a rather low clearance which gave me a few problems at Richmond in the mud ....but it does seem to have it's upside :-)
What positive thinkers we are!!

ps
Well done BTW .....good win I believe :-)

I'm sure naughty is one of my multiple middle names LOL.

Cheers for the mad one's good wishes and as for MUD, yikes, will be cleaning that off everywhere for a loooong time  ;)

The sticker was put on the back window of the car in the Tesco car park

Denese

> The sticker was put on the back window of the car in the Tesco car park

So it is just an enormous coincidence that your friends story so closely matches the one on snopes right down to the wording?  I think you have some very funny friends if they will do this to you without revealing that they are passing something on that they have heard somewhere else, Denese.

Hi,
Have only just got back to the tread as my hard drive froze and burnt out! The thread was to warn women especially to be carefull.
Surly, no one is silly enough to think it is only scarmungering? I my self and my husband have been mugged at 8 oclock on a lovely hot summer evening by three men came up behind hit my hubby over the head with a bottle split his head and glass all in his face, just to snatch my tiny bag with a purse lipstick and car and house keys in.
This is living in Birmingham. When we picked our new car up in March 08 the first thing they said to my handicapped daughter was lean how to press this button, it locks all Mom's doors in case she ever for gets when you get in.
My hubby goes mad and will not let me walk the dogs in the dark on my own. YES!! it is annoying.
It some times sounds like some people do not live in the real world. Or do they live in small country villages.
I would like to invit them to come to areas in Birmingham. They would not last 10 mins. Don't mean to sound awfull but! it is true.
I have lived in the area I do now, since 8 years old we used to play out till dusk. It was a very nice area. But! unforunatly no where in birmingham is that safe anymore.
I agree it is worse in many other countries, I love England.

Denese

Of course we have to be careful and aware of their surroundings but not everywhere is crime ridden and this story is scaremongering as it was not a true story that happened to your friend. 
I would think supermarket carparks are one of the safest places these days as they are generally well covered by CCTV and I certainly don't think woman should be scared into not even going shopping alone.

Thanks for sharing Denise, the trick you have described is very similar to no 11 here and according to the site "Bob Williams of the Metropolitan Police Crime Prevention Office" gave "invaluable help during the original preparation of this feature."

ETA, I'vej ust read some more of that site, unfortuantely I don't agree with steering wheel locks being any use as a deterrant to car thiefs. My hubby had spent 4 months & £2,000 working on a heap of a car, turning into something decent. He used to to go fidhing in, on returning to the car park, all he found was the steering lock - the thiefs had taken it off & nicked the car, that evening we had a call from the police to inform us they had found the car burnt out, a complete right-off, a smouldering shell :(

:-D  Don't you think the choice of music on that site is a dead giveaway to it's intentions?

> Don't you think the choice of music on that site is a dead giveaway to it's intentions?

OMG!!! I never have the speakers on - I just went back to listen - that is stupid!!!!

> that is stupid!!!!

I think it may be :-)

Jeangenie

I did not recieve an email???????????

Denese