Best Ways To Stop Porch Pirates In Woodbridge

WOODBRIDGE, VA — Online shopping has reached an all-time high due to the coronavirus pandemic as package thieves gear up for the holiday season in the Woodbridge area and across the country.

Residents can take several steps to prevent the theft of packages from their homes, according to Jason Alicie, an officer with the crime prevention unit of the Prince William County Police Department.

With so many people ordering items online for home delivery, especially during the coronavirus pandemic, package theft has become a year-round problem, not just a crime that happens during the holiday season, Alicie told Patch.

Residents should try to schedule deliveries on days they are going to be home. They can also request that drivers place a package at a side door or location where the package cannot be seen from the street, he said.

Another effective option for preventing package theft is the installation of a secured parcel box near the front door of a residence. The porch lock box allows delivery drivers to place packages inside the box where they will remain secure.

If residents have a Ring system or other home security monitoring system, they should make sure the camera is working properly and pointing in a direction where it will provide good footage to help identify a person who is stealing a package, Alicie said.

More than 5.5 million Americans have been victimized by package thefts over the past year, according to Finder, a personal finance comparison website, in a study released in November.

About $5.4 billion worth of items were stolen in package thefts from November 2019 to November 2020, the Finder determined.

Because of the busy online shopping month of December, that number is likely to grow by the end of the year.

Fewer people were in the nation’s malls on Black Friday, and Cyber Monday is expected to become the busiest online shopping day of all time when all sales are totaled, according to The Associated Press.

Overall holiday season sales in 2020 are expected to rise 0.9 percent, with a 36 percent jump in online sales, a study by the research company eMarketer shows.

Porch pirates could see a prime opportunity to take advantage of the expected spike in packages left at front doors.

They usually get away with it, too. Only 11 percent of victims said the culprits were caught, according to a 2019 study by C+R Research.

Who Steals A Package?

Men are found to be more likely to be both package thieves and victims of the crime, according to the Finder study. With 5.29 percent of men admitting having stolen a package compared with 0.85 percent of women, men are more than 500 percent more likely to be package thieves than women, the study found.

Seventeen percent of men say a package of theirs was stolen during the past year, compared with 11 percent for women.

Still, 86 percent of the nearly 2,000 participants in the study said they have not experienced a package theft since this time last year.

Prevention Tips

Here are five tips Finder shared to help Americans keep from becoming a victim of a package theft:

• Try curbside pickup: Drive to the store; most of them offer curbside pickup options.
• Use a post office box: This will ensure the package is handled by a professional at a Woodbridge area post office.
• Video surveillance: Doorbell cameras such as Ring can allow homeowners to scare away the thief in real time.
• Require a signature: This way, the package cannot go unattended.
• Have it sent to your workplace: Public places typically have a greater chance of using security cameras.

Alert The Police

If a package is stolen, residents should file a report with the Prince William County Police Department, Alicie said.

Residents can call the police non-emergency number at 703-792-6500 to report a stolen package, or file a report of stolen property on the Prince William County Police Department’s website.

The police department also partners with Ring through its Neighbors app. The app is used to monitor neighborhood activity; share crime and safety-related videos, photos and text-based posts; and receive regional safety alerts.

Police can only view content publicly posted by users to the app or those shared directly in response to a specific request from law enforcement. Tips shared are anonymous unless residents choose to identity themselves.

"We do encourage people to post their footage on the app," Alicie said. "If enough people are posting their footage, we'll find out there is a problem in a community and provide extra patrols or send out a message alerting the community to a rash of package thefts in the area."

Along with using the app, Alicie emphasized that residents should contact the police through the non-emergency number or online reporting system to let the department know about a stolen package.