COLUMBIA, Md. — Imagine getting home from a vacation to see you can't drive anywhere because all your wheels have been taken. It happened to one woman in Columbia last week.
It was a vacation to Puerto Rico for Michelle Lee and her partner. A time for relaxing and soaking up the sun, until she was notified of what was happening back at home.
"I turn the phone on and I have a Blink camera, so I looked on the Blink camera and I noticed that Howard County Police is knocking on the door,” said Lee, who lives in Columbia.
She called the police who informed her all four of the wheels on her Honda were stolen.
"I called Honda, I spoke with someone in service and they said 'oh yeah we are aware of it, it's happened weekly,'” said Lee.
Lee says she and her partner have lived at Huntington Square Apartments in Columbia for a year.
When they asked why the apartment didn't contact her when they saw the wheels were taken, she says the manager for the apartment gave this response, "He says that he didn't feel like it was an emergency, I tried to contact Michelle and it went straight to voicemail and he just left it at that.”
Soon after, Lee said a notification was sent out by email to all residents, stating in part they need to be aware of their surroundings and that no one can be responsible for your safety or your personal belongings.
But still nothing was mentioned that there was an auto related theft on the property.
"I get it, control what you can control, and at the same time crime is everywhere but if you can be preventative and control what you can control as much as possible, then maybe that wouldn't have happened,” said Lee.
But Lee said she just wants others to be aware so they can better prepare. “I asked him has this happened before and he says 'oh yeah, it happened a couple of months ago.' And I’m like wow if you had let us know that, if you would have let the community know that, then we would have never left our cars here on vacation.”
Lee said the lock lug nuts were also removed making her think this was an inside job. One mechanic shop, BA Autocare agreed that the person who did this would have specific knowledge of what's needed to remove the wheel locks.
"You have to have a special shape as opposed to being a universal that goes on and has to click, like a puzzle piece that goes on and does it. I know that certain dealerships always put them on they can add it as a add on to help it,” said Sandi Weaber, BA Autocare General Manager.
She says with the master key, the theft can take as little as 10 minutes to take all four wheels.
WMAR-2 News' Ashley McDowell reached out to Huntington Square Apartments to see if they will be informing their residents of the resent tire thefts on their property.
They said we need to wait for their PR department to respond.
