WASHINGTON — As car thefts continue to increase in D.C., a couple of friends ended up recovering two of them in the Capitol Hill neighborhood.
Brynn Barnett said she was dropping her friend off at home Monday afternoon near the corner of Ive's Place and 14th Street southeast when they noticed something odd.
Parked in her friend's backyard, or car port in her back alley, was a car she didn't recognize — and it was still running.
They took a closer look at the silver Hyundai Elantra and noticed that the steering wheel had been ripped out. They called police, who provided a report confirming the theft.
The report says the car had been taken Sunday night, with the victim realizing it was missing Monday morning.
The friends decided to walk a block to The Roost for lunch, came back, and near 15th Street Southeast, they noticed another suspicious car.
“When I came upon the second car, it just was kind of a little parked off-kilter. And getting closer to it, obviously one of the windows had been broken in," Barnett said. "So also looking closer at the steering column, which was torn off. So, it was pretty, pretty easy to recognize that things were amiss."
Barnett said this car — another silver Hyundai Elantra — was also still running. She called police, who confirmed this theft, too with an incident report.
The report says the theft victim left his car parked on the 900 block of 14th Street Southeast earlier in the day.
It says he discovered it was stolen when police called to tell him they had found it.
Officers not only found it with a smashed passenger window, but also damage to the passenger side front bumper.
“In the case of stolen cars, you know, you see all over Twitter that, you know, just because the owner is getting the car back doesn't mean that they've made been made whole again," Barnett said. "But it's also really unfortunate that, you know, not only on Capitol Hill, but all over DC, you know, people are just stealing cars, it's seemingly for the joy ride, and then they've damaged the car, and they're ditching it in our backyards, literally, which isn't a very safe thing.”
It's not a safe or a rare thing.
DC Police data shows that 5,535 cars have been stolen so far this year – more than double where car thefts stood at the same time last year.
Hyundais in particular have become a target.
To address this trend, the Mayor launched a program to give Hyundai and Kia owners free steering wheel locks back in February.
Over the summer, they also hosted a free clinic to install new anti-theft technology in Hyundais.