Bugging Car Thieves : Company Says Its Homing Device Will Lead Police to Stolen Autos
Few cars get stolen on Santa Catalina Island--in fact, more golf carts than automobiles are typically reported missing. But the resort off the coast of Long Beach is soon to become a strategic point in the battle against car thefts that occur elsewhere in Los Angeles County at a rate of more than 100,000 a year.
When the so-called Stolen Vehicle Recovery Network is inaugurated later this month, Black Jack Mountain on Catalina will be one of seven radio transmitter tower locations that authorities say will help put an invisible net over the county and snag stolen cars equipped with high-tech homing devices.
The installation of a transmitter on the island illustrates the steps that the LoJack Corp., the company that makes the tracking equipment, has taken to ensure that stolen vehicles can be found anywhere from the deep canyons of Malibu to the parking garages in downtown Los Angeles to the top of the mountains rimming the San Gabriel Valley.
The LoJack system--its name chosen to contrast with “hijack”--is an unusual partnership of police agencies, consumers and the private sector.
It is a costly endeavor. LoJack, a Massachusetts-based company, has contributed more than $2 million worth of computers and tracking equipment to local police. This month, 7-inch-long homing devices will be available to consumers at $595 apiece.
The price tag has some skeptics wondering if only upscale car owners will buy it, leaving police to track mostly the stolen cars of the wealthy.
“This is not a rich community,” said Lt. Tony Pennington of the city of San Fernando. “It is going to be interesting to see if these sell here. I don’t know if they will.”
LoJack insists, however, that all strata of automobile owners in Los Angeles will buy its product. In Southern California, “there is no question that your car is part of your persona,” said Terry Soley, general manager of LoJack’s California operations. “Are we in the right marketplace? You bet.”
LoJack is established in Massachusetts and Florida, and this year is branching out into New Jersey and Michigan as well.
But it was Los Angeles County, with its geography like a wrinkled blanket, that presented the greatest challenge to LoJack so far. Ranging from mountainous terrain and rolling hills to deep canyons and low passes, the surface features of the county can inhibit radio signals vital to the LoJack system.
“The hills work both for you and against you,” Soley said. “If I am a police officer and I go up in the hills, the good news is I will get tracking signals from a better distance.”
The bad news is that if the police officer is not at such a vantage point, the signal may be lessened, Soley said.
To overcome that, LoJack has concentrated more computer firepower in Los Angeles County than anywhere else it has sold its product.
In Massachusetts, for instance, the entire state is covered with five transmitter towers and about 300 police cars with tracking computers. In Los Angeles County, about a third the size of Massachusetts, 440 patrol cars have been equipped with the computers and seven towers crown mountains and the top of the First Interstate building downtown.
Generally, the system works this way: When a LoJack-equipped car is reported stolen, police alert the state Department of Justice to activate a computer. A radio signal is then sent from transmission towers to activate the homing device hidden in the car. Its signal can be picked up by computers in police cruisers miles away. Theoretically, officers then move in, recover the stolen car and possibly catch a thief.
The system has received good reviews in Massachusetts, where LoJack has been doing business about four years, and in Florida, where the program started up last year. Authorities say about 96% of the 1,000 LoJack-equipped cars stolen in those states have been found in an average 90 minutes--often before thieves have had a chance to strip the cars of parts.
Police and LoJack officials concede that car thieves can escape the net by quickly taking stolen cars out of the county.
“We are all concerned about a few cars getting to Las Vegas or San Diego,” Soley said. “(Helicopters) will help with the perimeter coverage. I think that the worst case is that we will lose a few percent.”
Another obstacle is that thieves could remove the devices, but LoJack officials said installation locations will vary from car to car in an effort to thwart that.
So far, all but two police departments in the county--Culver City and Long Beach--have joined the LoJack system, officials said. Los Angeles police studied the equipment for nearly three years and other local agencies have conducted numerous tests during training exercises this year.
In those trials, police and LoJack officials say, the homing device-equipped cars were found in minutes. Already, nearly 90% of the cars stolen in Los Angeles County are recovered. But most often recovery comes days after the theft and the cars have been stripped.
“It really works,” said LAPD Capt. Norman Rouillier, who supervised the department’s evaluation of LoJack, launched after his wife saw a television report on the Massachusetts system in 1986. “For our department, we think it has plowed some new ground.”
Los Angeles police will have 150 cars with tracking computers, and smaller departments around the county will be equipped with fewer.
In 2 1/2-square-mile San Fernando, police will have just one car equipped with a LoJack tracking computer. Since the computer has a tracking radius of 10 to 15 square miles, that is all that is needed, said Pennington, the head of patrols.
But in Culver City and Long Beach, police have chosen not to accept LoJack’s offer of a free $1,750 tracking computer and officer training. Officials said both cities can join after observing how the system works in the county.
“It’s impractical for our size city,” said Culver City Lt. Don Ericsson. “One of the reasons is the expense of equipment. The major reason is that our city is 4 1/2 square miles. The chances are that cars stolen here will be taken out of the city. We might be chasing cars outside the city and not have anybody working in the city.”
Ericsson also said that development of vehicle tracking systems “is a wide open field” and the city decided to be cautious before accepting LoJack’s product.
While officials with other departments concede that a plan for tracking stolen cars across jurisdictional boundaries still needs to be worked out, the departments are not locked into the LoJack system should another, better product come along.
LAPD’s Rouillier said a handful of electronics companies have produced tracking devices but the department believes LoJack’s system is most advanced. “We were given the old sales pitch by LoJack but we did our own evaluation,” he said.
After Los Angeles police came on board, the county Sheriff’s Department and the California Highway Patrol followed. Both also were given dozens of tracking computers free of charge. LoJack spent a year recruiting the smaller police departments in the county. Each was given one free tracking computer. Several of the departments bought more.
LoJack officials insist that the refusal of some departments to join the system does not leave holes in the net LoJack says it has cast over the county. Enough police cars are outfitted with computers in other departments to make up for the absences, they say.
Meanwhile, LoJack has encountered strong resistance from local makers of auto alarms and other anti-theft devices. Those competitors helped scuttle a 1988 proposal before the state Legislature to provide $1 million in public funds for a LoJack system in Los Angeles County.
Afterward, Clifford Electronics, a Chatsworth-based auto alarm maker, sued LoJack, saying it unfairly monopolizes the sale of the homing devices. The case was dismissed and is being appealed. LoJack, in turn, sued Clifford, accusing the company of unfair trade practices and conspiring with other competitors to ruin LoJack.
Another controversy cropped up last year when LAPD Chief Daryl F. Gates forced two employees--Cmdr. William Booth, chief spokesman for the department, and a civilian computer manager--to sell stock they had obtained in LoJack. Neither was in a position to help decide whether the department would back the LoJack system, but Gates urged them to sell the stock nevertheless. Earlier, LoJack faced a flap in Massachusetts in which a police official allegedly made a profit from LoJack’s stock while being involved in testing the system.
What remains now is for LoJack to sell its product to consumers. Soley said the company set a goal of 20,000 sales in the county for the first year, and has started a radio advertising campaign. He said 180 car dealerships in the county have been recruited to sell the device to new car buyers. Car owners who want the device installed can do so by directly contacting LoJack.
Los Angeles Police Cmdr. Lawrence Fetters said members of a police study committee he headed were originally “concerned” about whether the price of the homing device would result in only well-off consumers being able to afford them.
A check of LoJack sales in other states, Fetters said, showed the average value for a car equipped with the homing device was about $13,000. That indicates the devices are being placed in the types of cars most often stolen--high-end Japanese models, he said.
LoJack, according to Soley, has at least a $3-million investment riding on Los Angeles County and views the enterprise as a key first step to expansion statewide. Already, the company has begun approaching police departments in Orange County.
VEHICLE THEFT
YEAR L.A. COUNTY CALIFORNIA 1980 84,085 178,447 1981 83,221 167,347 1982 88,482 167,781 1983 88,705 164,485 1984 85,819 163,661 1985 90,806 178,597 1986 103,683 208,064 1987 107,414 231,452 1988 114,785 267,229 1989 129,275 295,789
SOURCE: California Highway Patrol
