TEXAS NUMBER ONE FOR HEAVY EQUIPMENT THEFT!

Certainly a dubious achievement but when you think about it, Texas is very, very big with a lot of heavy equipment.

Unfortunately, this particular studiy was not broken down by percentage of overall equipment in Texas and then compared with the other states' numbers, but broken down just by the number of pieces of equipment stolen from each state and from what kinds of locations they had been taken. For the years 2005-2007, with Texas leading, California came in with the second highest number of thefts, Florida was third, then North Carolina and finally Georgia in fifth place.

On October 27, 2009, the National Insurance Crime Bureau and the National Equipment Register said that over 13,500 pieces of heavy equipment were stolen in 2008 and that the top 5 states we just noted, accounted for a full 43% of that stolen equioment. Interesting? 57% in 45 states and 43% in 5. That must say something about something. But I digress. According to the reports, the majotity of the crimes occured when the pieces of equipment were at an address different from the home base from which they had been insured. Apparantly they were on lease or loan or out on a date or something. So those pieces of equipment that stayed home, like many of us, had a much better chance of staying home. Interestingly, when equipment was in transit it was by far the safest. Thefts when equipment was in the process being shippedor "on the road" were unusual if not rare. Reasonably, equipment that was made in the year 2000 and later accounted for over 79% of all thefts.

Riding mowers and garden tractors were the most attractive to the thieves and the second spot on the list goes to loader trucks such as backhoes and skid steer equipment.

According to the same reports, only 21% of the machines have been recovered, due to a number of factors, including poor to non-existant ownership records and the same problems with law enforcement records.

For more specific and detailed numbers you can go to http://www.onlineathens.com/stories/110809/bus_513471269.shtml, where they have a more complete report as the subject particularly relates to the state of Georgia