Posted on 12/12/2018 1:00:47 PM PST by SMGFan
Tired of Grinches stealing a little bit of Christmas, Jersey City and e-commerce giant Amazon are teaming up to put the fear of Cindy Lou Who into package thieves. Amazon has supplied the city with Ring video doorbells, “dummy” boxes and GPS devices to help catch porch pirates in the act -- or at least on video. The program is the first of its kind on the East Coast, Jersey City spokeswoman Ashley Manz said.
It didn’t take long to see how effective the tools, combined with a concerted effort by the police department’s Burglary Unit, could be. “Eight minutes after we put the program into action (Monday), we caught someone,” said Manz, who noted that by noon three people had been caught.
Exact figures on porch thefts are hard to track. A company commissioned by comparison-shopping service insuranceQuotes.com surveyed 1,000 people and extrapolated that 26 million Americans have had a holiday package stolen from their home. That would be nearly one in 12 Americans. Manz said Amazon had estimated their were 400-500 package thefts in Jersey City last year.
(Excerpt) Read more at nj.com ...
What about you in other cities? Have you been left out of the program?
I’m going to start stenciling Amazon swooshes on bags of yard waste so I can get more than two pickups a week.
Ryan Stein, Tallahassee, FL, likes to take packages off of porches, then “returns” them when the people are home, so he can case the house when they open the door.
Porch pirates? Is this what we used to call thieves or burglars?
Portland Oregon was doing this and quickly caught a black guy. The local paper ran the story with “porch pirate” in the headline. The local commentors claimed that “porch pirate” was a racist term... we’re not sure why. So today the headline was reduced to “pirate.”
Apparently “porch” was the trigger word. Some figured it was “pirate” that was racist against Somalis.
Arrrgh!!
Brings memory another inappropriate “Porch ———” term
Or ______ Pirate
And burglars are looking at your house looking to grab something while nobody is there.
4 ounces of C-4, a proximity switch/sensor and a one minute timer.
Once the package leaves the immediate area of the proximity sensor the timer starts.
A minute gives the thief time to get into their vehicle, but not enough time to get going very far or fast.
Boom. One less thief, and a very loud warning to those perhaps tempted to do the same.
“Pour encouragere les autres”...
perhaps because “porch monkey” was once a derogatory term for negroes
Saw a recent NCIS episode with a cold opening like that.
should call them Porch Grinches, Porch Scrooges etc . What do pirates have to do with Xmas?
It’s too bad they are doing this!
The best way to get rid of all the junk in your house is to pack it up in an Amazon box, tape it and put the box on your front porch. If this keeps up, I’m going to be forced to going back to making trips to the garbage dump again.
Semper Fi
How long before they say porch pirates is a dog whistle for a racial epithet
The thievery ends quickly.
Because there is a similar term that is racist and should not be used: "porch monkeys." However, the hysteria over any and all similar terms goes too far.
For the DIY impaired:
Invisible fence used to keep dogs on property. Sensor would be the one contained the respective dog collar that comes with the kit. Enough amps to set off a blasting cap.
Or..."If you can read this, you're in range"....
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