ST. CHARLES COUNTY, Mo. — St. Charles County Police shared video from a neighbor's home camera that caught at least three people attempting to steal cars from a Dardenne Prairie neighborhood.
"It's really an ongoing issue we've had for the last year and half that the entire region is seeing," St. Charles County Police Chief Kurt Frisz said.
Frisz said every now and then, they'll see a spike of auto thefts happen two or three nights in a row.
"They go into a neighborhood and start flipping door handles and try to start a car if it starts they take it, otherwise they just see what they can steal out of it," Frisz said.
Last Thursday, a woman's Infinity SUV was stolen at the BP gas station off Highway 67 while she was pumping gas.
"If they see a car running at the pump which generally isn't a safe practice anyway, they're patrolling the area for those opportunities," Frisz said.
Just over a year ago, they started an auto theft task force that's focused on catching violators and tracking trends.
Their auto theft task force has about 40 officers from municipalities all over St. Charles County.
"Just this month alone we've made 41 arrests. Most of those are felonies. Several stealing from motor vehicles and stealing motor vehicles, a lot of several firearms seized and a lot of drugs seized," Frisz said.
Frisz urges people to lock their cars and keep outdoor house lights on to help with video footage.
"The other thing that's of value to us is people submitting their camera footage from their home surveillance system. Our detectives can use that to piece these things together," Frisz said.
Their task force works with St. Louis County law enforcement agencies.. but help from the public can make all the difference.
"St. Charles County is a safe community overall it is, but these are people who come out here and take advantage of people feeling safe. So it's really just trying to educate our community, help us help them by locking their stuff up and taking their stuff out of the vehicles," Frisz said.
One of the cars stolen out of the Dardenne Prairie neighborhood was in the garage.
Frisz said you should not keep your garage door remotes inside of your car.