Warn visitors about car thefts

Car rental companies may be reluctant to advise tourists that belongings in their vehicles can be stolen rather easily, but warnings are badly needed. Such voluntary vigilance to forewarn travelers must increase, or legislation will be needed to make visitors aware of the risk in leaving expensive items in their rental cars.

Police say that the Dodge Charger has become the easiest rental car for a thief to enter, merely by applying a flat-head screwdriver in the keyhole. The Honolulu Police Department warned car renters last December that more than half of recent break-ins involved Chargers. Indeed, many Honolulu police officers who own that brand have installed their cars with alarms.

A few models of rental cars, even though they generally don’t sport company bumper stickers, are known by thieves as rentals. More than 10,000 cars are broken into in Honolulu in a single year, according to recent HPD statistics, many of them parked near popular tourist spots.

The Visitor Aloha Society of Hawaii counted 217 visitors who were victims of car break-ins in the first six months of this year, but that total is very partial.

California visitors Louis Ryan and his fiancee, Aileen Bautista, parked their car last December at Waimea Bay when $15,000 worth of items, including her engagement ring, was stolen from the locked Dodge Charger they had rented. Bautista said they were "in disbelief" when a police officer told them that "thieves always target our specific rental car, Dodge Chargers, as the easiest car to break into." The couple had planned a 60-person wedding on Oahu, but bad memories will cause them to wed elsewhere.

Unfortunately, some of Hawaii’s most scenic sites, such as Waimea Bay, also are known break-in hot spots for car thieves. Increased police patrols and public vigilance would be helpful deterrents against such crimes.

As for the Dodge Chargers: Rental companies attribute the car’s high theft rate to the heavy use of them in Hawaii rental fleets. However, data released last year by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration showed that the Dodge Charger, a sedan, was second only to the Ford Shelby Mustang GT, a convertible, in high theft rates across the country.

Whatever the reason or the make of car, state Rep. Tom Brower (D-Waikiki-Ala Moana) is preparing to introduce a bill that would require warnings to tourists. Rental companies would have to warn tourists in rental contracts not to leave valuables in the car; post warning stickers inside rental cars, especially riskier models; and report thefts and break-ins by make and model to police and the public. Brower also would include crime prevention tips for car renters in airplane welcome videos, but such scaring on flights for all incoming travelers — car renters or not — would be an overreaction.

Car rental companies need to step up their warnings to customers to be careful in protecting belongings inside the car; otherwise, legislation is warranted. Hawaii’s reputation already as a place where tourists risk losses from thieves requires measures that they be warned.