Anne Arundel County police are working with neighboring jurisdictions including Prince George’s County to determine how many people have had personal items stolen from cars while filling up gas in the past month.
There have been several thefts from cars at gas stations in Laurel and Hanover.
”Our detectives are in contact with the neighboring jurisdictions, they are always looking for any similarities and similar incidents to compare suspect information or vehicle information. We know that in one instance the license plate of one of the vehicles was a stolen license plate so that was sort of a dead end there,” Anne Arundel County police spokesman Marc Limansky said.
Police have responded to at least five similar incidents recently. Police shared surveillance videos with 7News, in them, you can see the assailants pull up — in most cases in either a gray Audi or white Honda Accord — and they quietly and quickly open the passenger door and steal items like purses and cellphones. In just 10 to 13 seconds they pull up and take off, and the driver pumping gas never notices.
Here’s a list of locations where police have been recently called to:
- BP at 3396 Laurel-Fort Meade Road
- Royal Farms at 3740 Laurel-Fort Meade Road
- Royal Farms at 7910 Shipley Homestead Drive
- Sunoco at 2739 Annapolis Road
- Shell at 3460 Laurel-Fort Meade Road
“People don’t realize until they get home that something now is missing from their motor vehicle, whether it’s a purse or a wallet or a cellphone, some type of personal item. So then they have to start backtracking and figure out where this actually occurred. So we really want people to be mindful now when they are pumping gas. Nobody wants to do this while they are pumping gas to make sure that no one is stealing things from them while they are distracted," Limansky said.