Rail Theft Soars in California(latimes.com)
latimes.com
Rail Theft Soars in California
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-01-16/rail-theft-soars-los-angeles-pilfered-packages-littering-tracks
326 comments
Pictures are worth way more than 1k words.
The photos are disturbing and a crime by definition is an attack on our social structure and shouldn’t be ignored.
But to put it in context, the rail company is reporting $5M in losses from theft last year, on $5.56B in revenue, or 0.1% of revenue. Not ideal but not massive either.
However, we don’t have pictures of white collar crime, just stats: https://techjury.net/blog/white-collar-crime-statistics/
In 2021:
> $56 billion were lost to white-collar crimes.
> Only 3% of federal prosecutions annually are for white-collar crimes.
> California lost $400.9 million to fraud.
> Cybercrime damage cost is said to reach $6 trillion annually in 2021.
Add to that the government corruption or wasteful spending of your choice.
Imagine if these white collar criminals broke a window or littered packages during their crimes.
While it’s easy to have a visceral reaction to photos of crimes, let’s not forget the unseen crimes that also affect us.
And for those that are worried these crimes are going unpunished, 100 people have been arrested to date per the article.
The photos are disturbing and a crime by definition is an attack on our social structure and shouldn’t be ignored.
But to put it in context, the rail company is reporting $5M in losses from theft last year, on $5.56B in revenue, or 0.1% of revenue. Not ideal but not massive either.
However, we don’t have pictures of white collar crime, just stats: https://techjury.net/blog/white-collar-crime-statistics/
In 2021:
> $56 billion were lost to white-collar crimes.
> Only 3% of federal prosecutions annually are for white-collar crimes.
> California lost $400.9 million to fraud.
> Cybercrime damage cost is said to reach $6 trillion annually in 2021.
Add to that the government corruption or wasteful spending of your choice.
Imagine if these white collar criminals broke a window or littered packages during their crimes.
While it’s easy to have a visceral reaction to photos of crimes, let’s not forget the unseen crimes that also affect us.
And for those that are worried these crimes are going unpunished, 100 people have been arrested to date per the article.
You’d think that all the empty packages on the ground would be a clue that there is package theft going on and that they should do something about it. Like avoid stopping in those areas, organize security, something. USPS recently lost my package in transit through LA, given the timing it seems likely it was stolen in one of these raids.
The photos look like something out of a 3rd world country.
Governments that aren't willing to use force to defend property inevitably wind up discovering that they have become ex-governments. Even Lenin had to dial it back to stave off the famines.
The title made me think this is about theft of actual rail tracks, which is a practice not unheard of in many parts of the world.
> Thieves are pilfering railroad cars in a crime that harks back to the days of horseback-riding bandits, but is fueled by a host of modern realities, including the rise of e-commerce and Southern California’s role as a hub for the movement of goods.
> Union Pacific reported what it claimed was a 160% increase since December 2020 in thefts along the railroad tracks in L.A. County
Both e-commerce and LA’s status as a hub are established. So why the increase now? I didn’t see a mention of economic realities driving crime, aside from the increased presence of homeless camps, such as skyrocketing costs of everything.
Means: your new home in California being a tent or car by the railway tracks
Motive: money.
Opportunity: unguarded rails and bottlenecked supply chain
America’s problems, especially the tragic amount of homelessness in CA, are becoming a lot harder to hide.
> Union Pacific reported what it claimed was a 160% increase since December 2020 in thefts along the railroad tracks in L.A. County
Both e-commerce and LA’s status as a hub are established. So why the increase now? I didn’t see a mention of economic realities driving crime, aside from the increased presence of homeless camps, such as skyrocketing costs of everything.
Means: your new home in California being a tent or car by the railway tracks
Motive: money.
Opportunity: unguarded rails and bottlenecked supply chain
America’s problems, especially the tragic amount of homelessness in CA, are becoming a lot harder to hide.
From the same article, while rail thefts are up 160%,
“According to LAPD data through Nov. 27, property crime was up 2.6% over the same period last year but is down 6.6% from 2019.”
“According to LAPD data through Nov. 27, property crime was up 2.6% over the same period last year but is down 6.6% from 2019.”
As previously seen on HN https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29930970
What is the solution here? Do trains need armed security when passing through unsafe regions?
This is the Twitter thread from 1/13 that I think kicked off the coverage. In some ways the thread is a lot better than the LA Times article in that the latter has only a few stills and no additional context.
https://twitter.com/johnschreiber/status/1481770722271760384
https://twitter.com/johnschreiber/status/1481770722271760384
Ungated link: https://www.yahoo.com/news/ugly-rail-thefts-leave-tracks-130... . Politicians, prosecutors, and activists who belittle the harm of property crimes are wrong to do so.
Feels like the country is failing to solve any real issues and is coming apart at the seams. You can blame many people, events and factors. But it's hard to ignore it anymore. Where the average person was 25 years ago and where they are now are not even comparable.
This stuff is a temporary problem caused by the backlog of shipping containers, giving an opportunity for some the less fortunate in L.A. to take advantage of the stopped trains. As soon as things are moving more smoothly again, the issue will go away.
This isn't indicative of society's collapse, nor of the anti-work masses rising up, nor even of a catastrophic government failure. It does point out once again that California has an untenable disparity of wealth and we need to continue to work on fixing that problem.
This isn't indicative of society's collapse, nor of the anti-work masses rising up, nor even of a catastrophic government failure. It does point out once again that California has an untenable disparity of wealth and we need to continue to work on fixing that problem.
Things like these are omens of what is to come if inequality continues to grow. It starts as high value items and ends with things like clothing, food, and other necessities. The rich get angry at the unreliable shipping so it's all done with armed guards. The transformation is complete (it arguably already is) when people are routinely killed over necessities for survival.
The future looks bleak and this will spill over and affect everyone. Or maybe I just have a pessimistic and wild imagination.
The future looks bleak and this will spill over and affect everyone. Or maybe I just have a pessimistic and wild imagination.
Is this happening in any Red States? I've not heard of these kinds of issues in Texas or Florida etc. Is it just in NY and California and some other Blue states?
Another reason that makes California look like not a great place to live from the sky high homelessness (i experienced that first hand WoW and in 2013) to this to the landslides, earthquakes, raging annual destructive forest fires, sky high cost of real estate... am i missing something (oh Google blatantly stealing from Sonos to MIT students)... im sure there's more.
I guess the good is the nice weather and beaches... what am i missing in terms of good?
I guess the good is the nice weather and beaches... what am i missing in terms of good?
Railroad theft sounds like a federal crime, the district attorney is partly to blame if they are charging these people under state trespassing laws instead of federal railroad laws [0]
[0] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1991
[0] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1991
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This is a great case study in how news media manufactures hysteria over commonplace occurrences. A reporter "keeps hearing of train burglaries on the scanner" and goes to take pictures, then tweets them. What did the location look like before? We don't know. Are the reports on the scanner more common? Also not discussed.
The tweets prompt reporters to start calling the usual suspects: The company experiencing losses gives one misleading comparison to locked-down 2020 and an absolute figure for losses rather than a relative comparison over time. That makes sense, because they want government and cops to step in so they don't have to cover it. Next up the reporters call LAPD, who have a political motive to imply that the problem is worse than ever, to justify increased jurisdiction and funding.
And that's… pretty much where it ends. Nobody bothers to look back to 2019 or before; nobody bothers to see whether a higher percentage of rail cars are looted, or whether there are now more rail cars and online shopping in total; nobody bothers to analyze whether the increased wait times or any other factor are in play. I would love to actually understand this issue, but the article is designed to shock me with photos of debris and make me feel as if anarchy has descended upon the streets of Los Angeles, a fear-based reaction that apparently many HN commenters are susceptible to. It's dismaying and ultimately unsatisfying to read when the only goal is to drive clicks and engagement.
The tweets prompt reporters to start calling the usual suspects: The company experiencing losses gives one misleading comparison to locked-down 2020 and an absolute figure for losses rather than a relative comparison over time. That makes sense, because they want government and cops to step in so they don't have to cover it. Next up the reporters call LAPD, who have a political motive to imply that the problem is worse than ever, to justify increased jurisdiction and funding.
And that's… pretty much where it ends. Nobody bothers to look back to 2019 or before; nobody bothers to see whether a higher percentage of rail cars are looted, or whether there are now more rail cars and online shopping in total; nobody bothers to analyze whether the increased wait times or any other factor are in play. I would love to actually understand this issue, but the article is designed to shock me with photos of debris and make me feel as if anarchy has descended upon the streets of Los Angeles, a fear-based reaction that apparently many HN commenters are susceptible to. It's dismaying and ultimately unsatisfying to read when the only goal is to drive clicks and engagement.
This news report from a month ago has a golden response from the sheriff https://youtube.com/watch?v=zN0CXUEMwjg
It’s remarkable to me that he didn’t have any awareness of this issue. But then again, who has jurisdiction over the railways?
It’s remarkable to me that he didn’t have any awareness of this issue. But then again, who has jurisdiction over the railways?
Deja vu
Wasn't this a twitter thread like a week ago?
Wasn't this a twitter thread like a week ago?
> recruited people living on the street to ransack the containers.
This is what happens when the richest country in the world has some of the poorest populations in the world. Poor people are neither violent nor thieves. But they can be convinced to become that when inequality is so high.
This is what happens when the richest country in the world has some of the poorest populations in the world. Poor people are neither violent nor thieves. But they can be convinced to become that when inequality is so high.
A lot of the lawlessness we are seeing is a direct result of us just standing idly by last summer when Manhattan was ransacked and cities had properties burned all over with windows knocked out everywhere. I even think (controversial opinion) that that lawlessness was a "green light" for what happened on January 6th. Why wouldn't you think if you see DC helicopter video of several blocks aflame in DC that you could storm the Capitol? Seems fairly rational to me (though wrong.) I don't think the "broken window theory" is 100% right, but there is certainly something to it. Instead of letting up on drug prosections, we've let some actual criminals go free, something I simply don't understand. Minor property descrtuction and theft can snowball.
Easy to figure out what's going on here. Online shopping has increased dramatically, but the amount of security around packages hasn't increased proportionally. Perhaps packages are harder to secure than retail stores, so we need a more than proportional increase.
This is one of those flashy problems that criminals come up with and then gets solved. Find an exploit, patch the exploit. I find it humorous because it give Republicans like Megan McCain to bloviate about what a shit hole California is. I'm writing from there now. Everything is fine.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29930970
Twitter thread with video of package litter and opened containers on rail cars.
LA Times does add significant detail and context to the story, and mentions John Schreiber's Twitter posts.