POLK CITY, Fla. — For the first time in years, porch piracy is showing signs of slowing down but with millions of packages stolen across the country, experts say the problem is far from solved.
Melissa Quiles has just completed her holiday shopping, most of which was done online.
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“Yes, so most my Christmas shopping was done on Amazon but ideally, I just have my packages delivered when I’m home,” Quiles said.
She will be keeping a close eye out for her deliveries, especially after learning that one of her neighbors recently had a package stolen.
“We’ve been talking about adding like a box for deliveries for Amazon packages, FedEx, things like that. That is kind of on the inside of our fence so it’s easier and then they’re less viewable,” Quiles said.
The Polk County Sheriff's Office is looking for two suspects who stole a package and wagon on Hammock Loop in Polk City on Dec. 10.
According to a new SafeWise Package Theft Report, more than 104 million packages were stolen nationwide in the past year. That is actually a 13% decline from last year.
“Package theft seemed to just explode on the scene around the time of COVID, which makes sense because we had more packages being delivered to our homes, more packages on the front porch, more opportunity. And it seems to have gone up almost every year since then, except for this last year,” said Dr. Ben Stickle.
Stickle is a professor at Middle Tennessee State University and a former police officer. He has studied hours of doorbell camera footage of porch pirates in action and has some advice on protecting your items.
“One is you could have your package try and deliver it at a time when you know that you’ll be at home. You could have it delivered to a trusted friend or a neighbor or maybe work if they allow you to do that. The other option, if you’re having a package delivered, is have something on your front porch that can block the view of the package from the roadway,” Stickle said.
Stickle said package theft is a crime of opportunity, and stopping it will require teamwork from consumers, law enforcement, retailers and shipping companies.
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