Honda Civic was carjackers' favorite model to steal in 2018

MutatedMango

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Older Civics, 5th gen from 96 to 98, get stolen for a few reasons. The door locks and ignitions can be turned with a shaved key. The cars run great and are fun to drive. And there are so many of them on the road there is plenty of demand for parts.

How do I know this? Two of those 30,000+ thefts last year were my 1998 Civic coupe. It was stolen out of my driveway early in the morning in April of last year. Fortunately it was ditched a few miles from my house and the police found it later that day. The door locks and ignition were intact. And I had the only proper keys. The thieves took it for a ride, cleaned out some stuff I had in it, and parked it.

Oh, and it has a manual transmission. So the belief that a MT will keep your older Civic from being stolen is ridiculous.

After that I knew they could take it any time (they knew where I parked it every night), so I went to pulling the fuel pump relay out when I parked the car in my driveway. But I didn't pull the relay when I parked it elsewhere. A few months later I parked at Costco on a Friday evening, was gone for 20 minutes... and my car was gone before I got back. Found out a group of thieves had been working that Costco for the previous month, stealing just older Civics (I found the list of recently stolen vehicles from the local PD; mine was the fourth Civic stolen from that Costco parking long in a span of two weeks.)

A few days went by, I figured it was gone. So I bought my 2018 Civic. And then the cops found my '98 abandoned a few miles from where it had been stolen... again with no damage to the locks or ignition.

If my experience is typical, then a lot of Civics are stolen with shaved keys for short rides, even if they have manual transmissions.
Wow you really like civic coupes huh
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vandalSI

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Older Civics, 5th gen from 96 to 98, get stolen for a few reasons. The door locks and ignitions can be turned with a shaved key. .
haha yep. me and a buddy both had ek hatches ten years ago and we could start each others' cars with our own keys.
 

16Extdtx

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Older Civics, 5th gen from 96 to 98, get stolen for a few reasons. The door locks and ignitions can be turned with a shaved key. The cars run great and are fun to drive. And there are so many of them on the road there is plenty of demand for parts.

How do I know this? Two of those 30,000+ thefts last year were my 1998 Civic coupe. It was stolen out of my driveway early in the morning in April of last year. Fortunately it was ditched a few miles from my house and the police found it later that day. The door locks and ignition were intact. And I had the only proper keys. The thieves took it for a ride, cleaned out some stuff I had in it, and parked it.

Oh, and it has a manual transmission. So the belief that a MT will keep your older Civic from being stolen is ridiculous.

After that I knew they could take it any time (they knew where I parked it every night), so I went to pulling the fuel pump relay out when I parked the car in my driveway. But I didn't pull the relay when I parked it elsewhere. A few months later I parked at Costco on a Friday evening, was gone for 20 minutes... and my car was gone before I got back. Found out a group of thieves had been working that Costco for the previous month, stealing just older Civics (I found the list of recently stolen vehicles from the local PD; mine was the fourth Civic stolen from that Costco parking long in a span of two weeks.)

A few days went by, I figured it was gone. So I bought my 2018 Civic. And then the cops found my '98 abandoned a few miles from where it had been stolen... again with no damage to the locks or ignition.

If my experience is typical, then a lot of Civics are stolen with shaved keys for short rides, even if they have manual transmissions.
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Sorry to hear. My 2017 Civic EX-T got broken into yesterday at work. Looks like they used a flathead screwdriver and it popped the handle off the door a bit. How can you prevent this in the future?
 

S2kx8

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Exactly what I was gonna say, older civics have always been at or near the top of the list for pretty much as long as i've been behind the wheel of a car.
Absolutely true. We’ve had two attempts to steal our 1995 EX Coupe when parked at a shopping mall. Both times the silent paging alarm called my phone and the Ravelco prevented starting the car. Caught the one guy right as the Police showed (impressive response time of less than two minutes I must say) the guy they caught was out of prison for auto theft only 4 days before falling back into his bad habits. Having a CCW does have its advantages…. “Hello car thief, meet my friend… Sig Sauer”….?
Honda Civic 10th gen Honda Civic was carjackers' favorite model to steal in 2018 B715AEDD-1F67-4C5B-B409-2CB9EF2F76C6
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