When freshman Corinna Papps walked out to her car the morning of Sept. 12, she found an unexpected surprise: two of her tires had been slashed.
Papps is just one case of vehicle vandalism that has happened at Baker University recently. Burglarized cars also have been reported.
“They slashed my (passenger-side) tires, so I didn’t realize when I got in on the left that they were slashed,” she said.
Papps had parked her car in the parking lot behind Pulliam Hall the night of Sept. 11. <br/>Kelsey Allen, a sophomore, also had her front and back passenger tires slashed, but doesn't recall the exact date. The incident occurred while her car was parked in front of Pulliam.Kelsey Allen, a sophomore, also had her front and back passenger tires slashed, but doesn't recall the exact date. The incident occurred while her car was parked in front of Pulliam.
Kelsey Allen, a sophomore, also had her front and back passenger tires slashed, but doesn’t recall the exact date. The incident occurred while her car was parked in front of Pulliam.
Allen also had her car broken into within the same week as the tire slashing.
“I’m not entirely sure (how they broke in) to be honest. I think my doors were locked,” she said. “They just like TP’d the inside of my car and moved everything that was in the back seat to the front seat, and they put a T-shirt over my steering wheel. They just kind of did stupid stuff to the inside.”
Although there have been multiple reports of slashed tires and car burglaries, Greg Neis, interim police chief of Baldwin City, said he has not heard any reports of actual car break-ins with broken glass.
“It’s my understanding that it’s mostly been unsecured vehicles,” he said. “They’re grabbing loose things out of the vehicle and going, like a GPS or an iPod or cash or whatever has been left in the vehicle.”
Neis said an easy way to help keep items in a car from getting stolen is to lock it.
“Keep it locked and keep your other items out of sight,” he said. “If they look in and don’t see anything, then they’re definitely not going to break in.”
He recommends keeping items like purses in the trunk if they need to be left in the car, because if a purse is left in plain sight the car is more apt to get broken into.
“They’re not going to break into a car just to nose around, they’ll do an actual break-in to get what they can see,” he said. “It seems like the ones we have here in Baldwin are just looking for an unlocked car, and when they find an unlocked car, they’re getting in to see what they can find.”
