Hot Spots: NICB’s Annual Report on Vehicle Theft

The National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB) released its annual Hot Spots vehicle theft report and California dominates once again. Hot Spots is a per capita review of vehicle thefts from the nation’s metropolitan statistical areas (MSA). NICB data is in line with preliminary FBI vehicle theft data for 2012 which appears to end an eight-year downward trend in vehicle theft. Final numbers will be published by the FBI in the fall, but preliminary 2012 FBI figures estimate a 1.3 percent increase in 2012 thefts from the previous year. Not surprisingly, eight of the top 10 areas are in California with the remaining two from the state of Washington.