Wheels Up: Tire Theft Growing
October 15, 2010 — -- In the movie "Gone in 60 seconds," a skilled car thief steals a hot rod in less than a minute.
That's the movies. Today, a different kind of theft is on the rise. It doesn't involve your whole car, just the tires.
Brent Taylor was at home in Houston with his 2008 GMC Yukon parked safely outside. Or so he thought.
"It's very frustrating, pretty angry when you first notice it, then it kind of turns into disbelief," Taylor told ABC News affiliate KTRK.
In 25 minutes, two men removed the tires and rims from his SUV and left it on cinder blocks for Taylor to find.
Surveillance video shows that the thieves slowed down only to hide from passing vehicles, rolling the tires away as they took them off the car.
"It is pretty brazen for them to do that with other people driving by," Taylor said.
Today's high-end wheels can cost more than a $1,000 each. Custom rims bring the total up to $2,000 each. At that price, they make an easy and appealing target.
Thieves are turning to auto parts instead of the whole car because vehicle tracking systems like OnStar and the increasing use of GPS devices makes it harder for thieves to steal cars and get away with it.
"If they show up with the right equipment or the right tools, they can have those tires off the car in five minutes or less," said Houston police officer Jim Woods.
That's not quite as fast as the 15 seconds it takes a NASCAR pit crew to do the job, but they have choreographed precision and pneumatic wrenches.
At an auto shop in New York, using only a star wrench and a rolling jack, two guys removed the tires in a matter of minutes.
