Cadillac Escalade Tops Theft List

General Motors Corp.’s Cadillac Escalade sport utility vehicle is the biggest theft target for the fourth straight year, with five times the rate of insurance claims as the average U.S. vehicle, a trade group said Wednesday.

The Escalade tops the Highway Loss Data Institute’s theft list because it’s “a big, flashy pop-culture vehicle” driven by professional athletes and television characters such as fictional Mafia boss Tony Soprano, said Kim Hazelbaker, the organization’s senior vice president. The 2007 model Escalade features a DVD screen and a sticker price of $57,280.

The institute publishes annual statistics and ranks theft risk using the average number of claims per 1,000 vehicles for recent model years. The latest survey covered the 2003 through 2005 model years.

“Almost one-quarter of the theft claims for the Escalade are for $40,000 or more, indicating that thieves often are stealing the whole vehicles and not just their parts,” Hazelbaker said.

The Arlington, Va.-based institute said 13.2 claims were filed for every 1,000 Escalades, with an average value of $17,913. That compares with an average of 2.6 claims per 1,000 for all vehicles in the model years studied.

The Escalade includes an anti-theft system that keeps the vehicle from being started without a key, and the company redesigned the safeguard for 2007 models, the trade group said.

Mitsubishi Motors Corp.’s high-performance version of the Lancer sedan came in second in the insurance claim survey. Two pickup trucks, DaimlerChrysler’s Dodge Ram 1500 Quad Cab and Ford Motor Co.’s F250/350 Super Crew, placed third and fourth, respectively.

Ford’s Taurus station wagon had the lowest rate of theft, 0.3 claims per 1,000 vehicles, followed by GM’s Pontiac Vibe.

Theft losses have declined about 25% in the last decade as automakers added protections, the group said.