Stop The Grinch

In the recently released movie, "The Next Three Days," actor Russell Crowe plays a school teacher whose wife is falsely accused of murder, serves time in a Pittsburg jail and faces the prospect of many more years locked away from him and their young son.

Desperate to free Laura (played by Elizabeth Banks), John (Crowe) resorts to a well-planned scheme for her escape. Without giving away too much about the plot of this edge-of-your-seat, what-would-you-do drama, suffice it to say that John uses a clever method to open a car door that is also described on the Internet as a way to unlock your vehicle in case you leave the keys inside.

The problem is, of course, that it works for thieves as well.

The process is simple. Take a tennis ball, burn a small hole in it and place it over the keyhole of the door handle of your car. Then punch the ball so the sphere collapses and pushes the air into the keyhole. This will pressure the internal locking mechanism and unlock the door.

From our research, it's not entirely clear if this works on all locking mechanisms and whether, in some cases, it will set off the car's alarm. But it's reportedly a popular lock-picking trick used by those who want to get into your car without your permission.

And that brings us to the point of this editorial.

In recent weeks, several Waitsburg-area residents have had their valuables stolen from their vehicles, some parked in the street, another in an unlocked garage. In at least two cases, the doors were locked (or relocked), and the items inside were gone.

Our reason for sharing this and for explaining at least one stealthy method thieves have found to open car doors without resorting to the loud process of breaking the window is that simply locking your car doors with your valuables inside isn't going to protect you against theft.

The Grinch has found a way to possibly steal your Christmas, or Christmas presents, and sneak off with them into the night. He has been successful in our community already.

Don't let this happen to you or your visitors over the holidays or any time in the future. It's always a smart idea to remove all valuables from your vehicle and take them inside your house, but now that you're armed with the knowledge of new popular break-in methods, it's particularly important to change habits that develop easily in small towns with a relatively low crime rate.

When we moved to Waitsburg a year and a half ago, I was reticent to lock the doors to my car or our house. After all, we wanted to believe our town was so safe we needn't worry about theft. Everybody in town is honest.

We still think the very best of our fellow residents, and Waitsburg continues to feel like a true community in which neighbors and citizens look out for each other.

But we also realized most residences and cars in town are within easy walking or driving distance from Highway 12 and Highway 124. Thus, they make easy targets for thieves or gang members hitting town late on a weekend night to load up on saleable valuables, as we suspect they have in recent weeks.

Being ahead of them so they come up empty is the best way to discourage their return to town. The same goes for securing your home if you're gone during the holidays.

And the Walla Walla Sheriff's Department advises you to remove your mail from your mailbox every day to avoid being hit by mail theft that increases during the holidays as families and friends send each other checks, gift cards and other valuable presents.

By the same token, do not leave valuable outgoing mail in your mailbox but deposit it at the post office instead.

From our families to yours, have a very Merry Christmas and all the best for 2011.