TEMPLE, Texas — Temple Police say there have been 215 stolen vehicle reports in six months from August 1 to January 31.
In that same time, 146 vehicle burglaries were also reported to police.
Sgt. Joe Dimento is with Temple Police Department's property crimes and believes almost all of these were done by a group of 20 kids from across Bell County.
"We’re starting to see a reduction in the overall incidents because they’re just getting bored," he said.
Sgt. Joe Dimento attributes this to KIA and Hyundai manufactures beefing up their security features. He told TPD continuously patrol neighborhoods and communities.
As previously reported, KIA and Hyundia vehicles were primarily targeted because of their lack of safety features.
He told me boredom is what’s getting these kids in trouble, adding these types of crimes are today's generation of egging of toilet papering a home.
Almost all of those vehicles were found and kids who are caught, likely have committed these crimes many times before, he said.
So what happens once repeat offenders are caught?
Sgt. Joe Dimento explained there are multiple scenarios that could happen but putting them behind bars is not likely and said, "stipulations on their probation, sometimes it means their probation gets extended, sometimes it means they add a curfew.”
"But ultimately what it boils down to is are the parents cooperative? Are parents engaged in improving this behavior.”
SGT. Dimento told me the criminal justice system, as a whole, is trying to save kid’s futures by not locking them up right off the bat.
“If this was gang violence, these kids would have been locked away for this kind of behavior but because it is a property crime I think the underline goal is to improve the behavior" adding "this is not just a problem in Temple, “It’s just a really complex problem that we haven’t seen in recent years.”
Thursday afternoon, 25 News heard back from Bell County officials and are working with them to set up an interview to learn more about the county's justice and probation system.
