Fleet Management News & Business Info | Commercial Carrier Journal
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FLEETS TAKE MANY PRECAUTIONS TO COMBAT CARGO THEFT, RANGING FROM SIMPLE LOW-TECH PADLOCKS TO HIGH-TECH TELEMATICS. PREVENTING CARGO THEFT C Cargo theft is a growing problem in today's tough economy, and while no fleet is immune, there are steps anyone can take to combat it. argo theft isn't a new crime. One could argue that it's one of mankind's oldest wrongdoings, developing in parallel with civilization over thousands of years. What is piracy other than cargo theft on the open sea? Today, truck fl eets across the country face increased pressures from cargo theft, and the main reason isn't hard to discern: Hard times drive people to desperate acts. And in the minds of many, cargo theft is a victimless crime of opportunity. Go to a truck- stop. Spot an unsecured trailer. Wait for the driver to leave. Open the trailer up and see what's inside. No one gets hurt. Right? Wrong. The reality that far from being a victimless crime, today's hard economic times are driving an uptick in violent attacks related to cargo theft. "Whether it's going to be the theft of our cargo, or the theft of our tractors and trailers, we're fi ght- ing it every single day, and lately it's been getting worse," says Bill Boehning, corporate director of security for Prime Inc., a Springfi eld, Mo.-based refrigerated carrier. Boehning says Prime is seeing more blatant behavior in how criminals steal its cargo, including hijackings, robberies at 54 COMMERCIAL CARRIER JOURNAL | OCTOBER 2012 gunpoint and drivers being as- saulted. "We're getting reports of crooks blocking trucks with multiple vehicles, pulling drivers out and tasering them. It seems like it's escalating and ramping up quite a bit from the types of crime we used to deal with," Boehning says. Hard to define Cargo theft involves a wide range of strategies and felons. Many thefts simply are crimes of opportunity where the driver isn't a target but is simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, but a large percentage of these crimes BY JACK ROBERTS are carried out by organized groups ranging from a small band of friends to urban gangs – and even branches of organized crime. In the latter case, fl eets are dealing with sophisticated, determined criminals who conduct extensive research on their intended victims and exercise extreme patience before striking. Criminals have been known to follow drivers with high-value loads on multiple runs for hundreds or even thousands of miles to learn the driver's habits – what truckstops he likes, where he likes to spend the night and