Minneapolis police: 500+ cars damaged in smash-and-grab trend

Vandalism hits Minneapolis car owners

Police say three juveniles are now in custody in connection to a crime spree throughout Minneapolis in recent days. An uptick in vehicle vandalism has affected more than 500 vehicles so far this year, according to officials. FOX 9?s Soyoung Kim has the latest.

MINNEAPOLIS (FOX 9) - Minneapolis police are sounding the alarm on what they are calling a smash-and-grab crime trend happening across the metro.

Sounding the alarm

The backstory:

The Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) said property crime patterns have increased dramatically in the past month.

"In Minneapolis, over 500 since we’ve had this problem we believe are connected to the spree," Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara said on Tuesday.

Minneapolis police detail vehicle vandalism [FULL]

Saying they have arrested three juveniles they believe to be involved, Minneapolis Police Department Chief Brian O?Hara details a spree of vehicle vandalism throughout the Twin Cities in recent days.

Latest spree:

Shattered glass lined both sides of the street on Nicollet Avenue near 22nd Street in Minneapolis, where multiple parked cars had their windows smashed in the early morning hours on Tuesday.

In the most recent spree, MPD said there have been more than 100 reports of cars damaged overnight all across the city.

"It’s multiple individuals getting out and using some type of blunt object to break the window of parked vehicles," O’Hara said.

Authorities said there were dozens of similar incidents reported in neighboring cities around the same time as well.

What they're saying:

On Tuesday, O"Hara said the team is making progress cracking down on this spree.

"We have recovered two stolen vehicles earlier today that we believed are involved in some of the damage. And we have three juveniles that are now in custody. At this point, those three juveniles have been booked for auto theft," said O’Hara. "One vehicle we believe that was connected to the spree last night was recovered in the second precinct. The second vehicle was recovered with the three arrests in the fourth precinct. We will continue to use our Crime Pattern Response Protocol, continue these investigations, and continue working with all our law enforcement partners."

Authorities said they are still investigating why they are seeing this uptick all across the metro, but said they have noticed a pattern.

"This specific problem appears to be a crime spree with juveniles," said O’Hara. "A common denominator we’ve seen is joyriding in stolen cars and then other problems."