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Comment by bryanlarsen | Hacker News Reader

I don't think there's anything more guaranteed to turn a 12 or 13 year old into a lifelong criminal than what I think you're implying by "real correction in behaviour"; aka a multi-year prison sentence.

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If someone is stealing cars at 12 or 13 years old, they're already well on their way down the path towards irredeemability. Society has to do something or they will turn into a lifelong criminal. A multi-year prison sentence is probably not going to help them, but counseling, a better home and school environment, food in the belly, and so on might. You have to do something besides "catch and release" which has been the default in the USA for some time.

USA crime is still very low compared to pretty much the entire 20th century, it seems early to proclaim certain approaches as a failure.

FWIW, catalytic converter theft was recently a big problem in the US and the classic approach of getting the FBI involved, identifying the high-level fencers and arresting, was incredibly effective and cat thefts have plummeted.

I suspect disrupting the organized crime in Canada would work similarly well at reducing car theft.

It's only the case if people don't deny that the crimes exist, and Canada might suffer a bit from that lack of recognition.

In France as well, if you mention that there is criminality, people will frown upon you.

"No it's 100% safe country, it is a feeling of being unsafe".

I am someone you would label a ‘crime denier’ because I feel the problem is definitely smaller than in the past and it is generally overstated in the media. That is precisely why I think we should focus on organized crime and the driving clearing houses rather than individual street-level criminals.

I used to be like that, then I started seeing things happening myself. The first time you see Kia Boyz smashing windows and grabbing purses in a grocery store parking lot at noon on a Sunday is an eye opener (Do they want to get caught? this is pretty blatant, maybe they know we don't have many police these days). I always thought our crime problem was limited to porch piracy and street parked cars getting their windows bashed in at night (you know, typical drug addict crime), but nope, we have another problem.

I hear what you're saying, I live in SF. My opinions are evolving on the subject. There is a lot of not profit-driven vandalism and violence that I witness here and disrupting fencers will obviously do nothing for that.

But for car theft & other profit-driven commodity thefts, I do think targeting the markets can often be very effective.

I don't know. Many of these kids...they are from war torn communities (legal immigrants, refugees). They might be working through huge trauma, and they don't seem very organized at all (steal a car to...steal another car and/or knock over a gas station...then abandon the car on the street somewhere). There really isn't a market to target, the cars are almost always found after a few days, just trashed and damaged. They are just used for other crimes mostly.

The drug addicts are much more organized in comparison (steal legos at Target, fence at some place for fentanyl).

In the US* but in Canada (subject of this article) many are shipped off - ie. 10% are never recovered in US, 40%+ never recovered in Canada.

Yep. I don't know anything about car theft outside of where I live (Seattle), so its not even generalizable to the rest of the states, and I'm commenting specifically on Kia Boyz car thefts...I'm sure Seattle has actual car thieves who are stealing cars to sell them off and not just cause general very visible chaos. Although statistics show most stolen cars are recovered here in Seattle:

https://www.seattle.gov/police/crime-prevention/vehicle-thef....

86%.

> The vast majority of auto thefts are committed by criminals looking for temporary transportation. Thus, most vehicles are recovered within a few weeks to a month and with relatively little damage. Very few vehicles are stolen for parts.

Nearby Vancouver, at least, tracks Seattle:

https://www.ufv.ca/media/assets/ccjr/reports-and-publication...

> It should be noted, however, that British Columbia also had the highest rate of recoveries of stolen cars (91 per cent) compared to the national average (73 per cent) (Fleming, Brantingham, & Brantingham, 1994).

That data might be outdated though.

It really depends where you live in France. You have a big fence left in the west, a 'casse' near bordeaux, but you won't really find anything from violent crime (copper, stolen cars, phones and bikes at most, and most of the activity is genuine).

It's also a good way to know if organized crime is present in your area. If water distribution and/or trash collection is privatized to a 'local' company, you probably have some :)

The rest of the west, even Nantes and Rennes are really chill.

The issue in France is the resurgence of organized crime since 2004-2006. The tough on small crime policy jailed small magrebi caïds (basically local slumlords and drug dealers). Some local caïds gangs were strong enough to endure the storm and to emerge as stronger gangs, but organized crime from southern France (Grenoble, Marseille), and new gangs used that time to carve parts of Lyon and Paris. New crime families emerged around 2012, and around 2015 (I was living in Paris at that time) it could have turned really bad. Rumors of missile launchers, ak47 and other nice stuff in every shop. Things calmed down for no reason (I think the travellers families and magrebi gangs decided to share territory after the terror attacks and Sentinel), nothing really exploded, I left Paris.

To me, the only true violence left in 2023-2024 is around Marseille, near Monaco (Russian mafia left a big hole recently), in camargue (because of the new travellers families). Maybe it'll start again in Paris and Lyon, hopefully not.

The premise that catalytic converter thefts have plummeted in the last few years is incorrect. In fact, recent data indicates that vehicle-related thefts, including catalytic converter thefts, have surged. According to a report by the National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB), the nation experienced more than 64,000 catalytic converter thefts in 2022, with California and Texas leading the country in these incidents[3]. This represents a significant increase from 16,660 claims in 2020 to 64,701 in 2022, indicating a rising trend in catalytic converter thefts[3].

Furthermore, overall vehicle thefts have also increased. The FBI's annual crime report showed that there were 721,852 car thefts across the country in 2022, up from 601,453 incidents in 2021 and 420,952 reported in 2020[2]. This surge in car thefts has been attributed to various factors, including economic downturns, supply chain issues, and the high demand for cars and parts[4]. Additionally, a viral TikTok challenge encouraging the theft of Kia and Hyundai vehicles for joyrides, known as performance crime, has contributed to the uptick in car thefts[2].

Therefore, the data clearly indicates that catalytic converter thefts, as well as overall vehicle thefts, have not plummeted but have significantly increased in the last few years.

Citations: [1] https://www.iii.org/fact-statistic/facts-statistics-auto-the... [2] https://nypost.com/2023/10/18/car-theft-soared-20-last-year-... [3] https://www.nicb.org/news/news-releases/catalytic-converter-... [4] https://www.deepsentinel.com/blogs/car-theft-statistics/ [5] https://www.forbes.com/sites/jimgorzelany/2023/11/06/report-... [6] https://www.statista.com/statistics/191216/reported-motor-ve... [7] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/car-thefts-are-on-the-rise-why-... [8] https://stateline.org/2024/02/09/car-thefts-and-carjackings-...

No, you're looking at old data. Cat thefts in 2023 halved compared to 2022.

https://www.nbcnews.com/data-graphics/catalytic-converter-th...

My comment was confusing so let me address what you are saying:

1. This is a very recent thing I am discussing, the fencers were only arrested in the beginning of 2023 and the thefts have fallen in 2023, specifically second half. This should be available in more fine-grained crime stats or simply by looking at like google trends of catalytic converter replacement searches.

2. Crime is much lower than in the 20th century, but I agree there has been a post-pandemic upshift.

e: found some news articles https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/california-catalytic-...

this trend is after they busted a billion dollar auto parts company for being heavily involved in fencing these parts, seized 500 million dollars, and other anti-fencing provisions were made

> this trend is after they busted a billion dollar auto parts company for being heavily involved in fencing these parts

Do you mean DG Auto Parts (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020–2022_catalytic_converter_...) or is there another auto parts chain I should avoid.

Ah yes, that's the one. Misremembered the apprehension date slightly. There have been subsequent arrests in the Bay Area of people who were part of the supply chain for this group.

Agreed, it really is a paperwork issue. Just have transport and shipping companies require proof of ownership prior to accepting the car, and these thefts will evaporate overnight. Without a channel to market, it eliminates the incentive for thieves to steal your car in the first place.

It's not a tech problem, rather a legislative one. Too bad it won't fly because the current govt. has made it a habit of treating every issue as a wedge issue.

I think part of the problem is also that as criminal trade becomes lucrative & there are more crackdowns in other potential venues, more and more capital is being spent to basically build up these ports in Canada as criminal strongholds.

There is likely significant political shielding for the operation of these criminal groups in many Canadian ports.

if someone is 12 or 13, they're far more receptive to change than a CEO whose spent their life stealing wages.

one gets constantly brought up while the other is celebrated.

> if someone is 12 or 13, they're far more receptive to change than a CEO whose spent their life stealing wages.

Yes! Which makes our lack of action even more tragic.

when we consider wage theft as a significant driver of poverty, punishment for the 13 year old is more useless than anything.

So you would condemn the 13 year old to a (likely short) life of hardship because wage theft is a more important problem?

mmm

> counseling, a better home and school environment, food in the belly, and so on might.

This seems right for preventing criminals from forming out of otherwise-blank-slate children, but what do you do with these kids? There's no magic wand that turns their home & school life right.

On the other hand, there are plenty of kids who had a perfectly fine and financed upbringing who turned into criminals and terrors, they just tend toward white-collar crime.

This brings us full circle to the original comment that religion used to serve a useful purpose for society that's been largely lost -- a set of ethics & morals, and if those don't take real well there's always the all-seeing entity watching you at all times. In modern times the all-seeing eye of God has been replaced by surveillance cameras, but what is the base of morals replaced by?

>a set of ethics & morals, and if those don't take real well there's always the all-seeing entity watching you at all times.

Do you think we didn't have crime when the church was in charge?

Is that really what you think I said? How about making a point with less snark to it that I could respond to?

The first thing is that there are no universal sets of morals. Ethics is a totally different beast but it’s something I’m not sure a young kid can wrap their heads around. But following “the rules” is something you can teach a kid and works until they are old enough to know when to break the rules.

One thing we stressed to our son is: if you break the rules/laws, you will eventually get caught. So make sure whatever you are doing is worth the consequences.

There’s no need for some magical god to punish people, just the fact that, eventually, someone will figure out what you did (or more likely, they’ll tell on themselves). It’s worked so far…

> The first thing is that there are no universal sets of morals.

That's a belief presented as fact. I'm not super excited about getting into a philosophical debate, but just something to consider:

"The rules: help your family, help your group, return favours, be brave, defer to superiors, divide resources fairly, and respect others’ property, were found in a survey of 60 cultures from all around the world." -- https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2019-02-11-seven-moral-rules-found...

It’s a fact because I think we can agree there is at least one person on this planet who has counter-morals to any morals you present, for example. As long as one person on this planet has a difference of opinion on what morals they abide by, there can be no universal morals. That IS a fact, not an opinion.

Your unstated assumption is that universal agreement is required for universal morals to exist

I’d love to hear an argument showing that a universal moral doesn’t need to be applied universally and still be considered universal.

Do you know about the endemic of illiteracy in the US right now? More likely than not that child can't even read above a 2nd grade level.

We could have real rehabilitation centers focused on educating the kids, treating them like human beings with respect, and show them how to live life well.

Or we could put them in kid-jail and be put at a higher risk for all sorts of violence and abuse just to punish them.

As long as people hold the opinion that a 12 year old is "well on their way down the path towards irredeemability", we won't ever move past revenge based for-profit prisons and the crime problem will continue to get worse as these illiterate and stunted children are released back out into society.

Even better, we could focus on educating them properly the first time!

What teachers are saying is that socio-economics prevent any type of education from happening in many cases, i.e. there are many, many children who are going to struggle mightily unless the totality of their life systemically improves. Could teachers improve? Probably. Are teachers the underlying problem? I used to think so, but in dealing with our own school board/system it's very clear this is not the case.

That's easy. We just need to halve class sizes, fire half of the administration, double the pay for teachers in the worst districts, and raise the floor of the child social safety net to the point that even having complete fuckups for parents won't ruin your life.

For profit prisons are the minority of all prisons.

> I don't think there's anything more guaranteed to turn a 12 or 13 year old into a lifelong criminal than what I think you're implying by "real correction in behaviour"; aka a multi-year prison sentence.

Society had better correct that problem quickly or those two 12/13 year old kids are going to have ruined their lives by the time they turn 18. Something drastic has to be done, a slap on the wrist and sending them back to their parents isn't sufficient. Right now we fail on both sides of the pendulum, maybe its time to rethink things.

I do think Europe does deal better with this. Even in France, they have a fairly aggressive/intolerant police force, but a real correction focus once arrests/convictions have occurred.

The problem cannot be corrected by locking them in a room until they're 25, then releasing them.

The problem also cannot be corrected by letting them run wild until they are 18, and then locking them in a room until they are 50, and then releasing them.

Criminality is congenital. Social interventions will not fix the kid. Neither for that matter will prison, but at least it will protect the rest of us from his increasingly violent depredations.

> Criminality is congenital.

This is a categorically disproven view. Thankfully, it's no longer widely held, but unfortunately not before it was used to justify millions of cruel acts from eugenics to genocide.

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