DRUGS DRIVING CAR THEFTS IN CBRM: POLICE CHIEF

SYDNEY -- John Yhard can call on personal experience when it comes to
the problem of car theft in the Cape Breton Regional Municipality.

Last summer, a thief stole his 1997 Dodge Neon, a model that is
apparently easier to break into than other vehicles because of its
window design. The car was found parked on another Sydney street a
week later but repairing the damage cost Yhard $400.

"I felt very violated," he said Thursday. "That's something you
worked for and it is yours. I look after the car, it is a great
little car and someone walks into your yard and decides they want it.
They didn't work for it."

Yhard has since equipped the steering wheel of his car with a locking device.

Car theft increased in the Cape Breton Regional Municipality last year.

Police say there were 218 car thefts in 2005 compared to 257 last
year. So far this year, there have been 25, although the number tends
to increase in the summer months.

Const. David MacGillivary said police have also received more than 75
complaints about vehicles being broken into so far this year.

"I think it's just people who are breaking into cars looking for
loose change, credit cards, wallets, purses, anything they can get
real quick," he said.

"It seems like every time you turn around, there is a car being broken into."

Car owners should lock their vehicles and not leave anything of value
inside, he said.

Police Chief Edgar MacLeod said drug users are behind a lot of
thefts, including cars.

"I suspect that car thefts, like break and enters and robberies, are
all fuelled by people trying to convert quickly items into cash to
purchase drugs," he said Thursday. "I mean that's what's driving most
of the crime -- almost 90 per cent.

"It's creeping in everywhere, even in rural areas."

Cars are also stolen by criminals who need wheels for some other
crime or by young people out for a night of joyriding, he said.

"They just take the car for a ride, take it around, often they will
leave it somewhere undamaged although sometimes it gets damaged in an accident.

"But they just take it for the thrill."

Chop shops, where high-end cars are broken down into parts, are
another market for stolen vehicles, he said.

The police chief said car theft is also an international business in
which vehicles stolen anywhere in North America go into containers to
be shipped to Europe or South America.

"We get a lot of that, big time, the stolen cars coming out of
Canada, especially the newer vehicles and high-end vehicles."

Police in Canada working with the insurance industry have been
encouraging the use of immobilizing devices to inhibit car thefts.