Copper Theft still on the rise

Death from the Sea · Post by **Death from the Sea** » 2008-08-19 10:49pm

link1 and link2

the first link is a news story about how even illegal scrap yards are making lots of $$$$ on (stolen) scrap metal.

The second link is a news story about how now crooks stealing copper for scrap metal are taking it straight from cars in parking lots and driveways.

I hope that the law is changed here in Texas for illegal scrap yards to reflect how it is for the individual crook stealing scrap metal. They made it a felony in the last few years to steal scrap copper and some other metals.

Some crooks are so dumb and desperate they steal the copper wire used as a ground wire on some power line poles and from electrical boxes that are "hot".

How is this across the rest of the country? Or even Canada or other places?

Buddha · Post by **Buddha** » 2008-08-19 10:58pm

It's interesting how widely stolen copper is. Whenever you have an abandoned building, the first thing to go are copper pipes and wiring. Must be valuable stuff and get a good chunk o'change.Of course it's used to buy drugs, cigarettes, and alcohol.

Ender · Post by **Ender** » 2008-08-19 11:00pm

Shit, ordering screwup on my ship meant we ended up with a 75 lb roll of copper wiring that no one could use. If I had had a way to get it to my car I would have sold that shit for cash money. As it was, we used it for lockwire. What a waste.

Elfdart · Post by **Elfdart** » 2008-08-19 11:59pm

I described what happened July 4 in the Hall of Shame. Short version: Some thieving peckerwoods cut down the telephone pole in the vacant lot next to my house and took off with about 100 yards of very heavy copper cable -about $11-12,000 worth, according to the phone company.

Siege · Post by **Siege** » 2008-08-20 06:50am

Copper theft is definitely on the rise in the Netherlands as well. Electrical wire, plumbing pipes, copper crowns off church statues, public art, everything copper gets stolen, sold and smelted.

It's a damn waste, too: several pretty nice pieces of public art in my city have vanished with nary a trace. I used to live across the street from a statue that one day vanished. Several artsy types who lived a floor down made a new statue to place it on the now-empty base... Which actually looked nice until it too was stolen mere days later. And this is right in the middle of the city center too, underneath a bloody streetlight.

I've been told it's not just copper either, but also other materials. Still, copper is the most noticeable (pretty hard to not notice copper theft when your train is delayed because some fucker got himself electrocuted trying to steal the overhead wiring...)

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2008-08-20 07:11am

when your train is delayed because some fucker got himself electrocuted trying to steal the overhead wiring...

Ah, karma.

Copper theft is a problem here too, especially along the train tracks. It's been out of the news for a while after they tightened security, so maybe it got better, but it's still a big and potentially very dangerous problem. I've heard suggestions to slap copper thieves with endangerment along with theft, and I can't say I'd be opposed to that; the harder this is punished, the better.

Post by **Broomstick** » 2008-08-20 07:50am

In my area we've had thieves hitch a truck to an electrical transformer and haul it out of the ground to sell for scrap.

We've also had problems with theft of aluminum siding right off of occupied houses and thieves stealing catalytic converters from vehicles parked at the shopping mall (not just copper in that, but other valuable metals).

Mind you, not a constant problem, but it does happen. We probably have more problems with aluminum theft around here - over the years a lot of copper thieves had gotten electrocuted, which tends to short circuit their career, whereas stealing the sides off houses it less likely to get your ass zapped with electricity.

Julhelm · Post by **Julhelm** » 2008-08-20 05:01pm

Here they even steal the shit from churches which have copper roofs. Also the newest trend is that they now steal the sewer lids that are in the streets.

Pelranius · Post by **Pelranius** » 2008-08-20 06:44pm

Considering how all the old buildings at my college have copper roofs, I wonder if some inbred Mainer rednecks are going to come around. Though considering the amount of security guards and Marine OSC to be students around, they would be advised to go bother Colby instead (Colby, strangely enough, has a ROTC program so they probably shouldn't try that place either).