Beware of book thieves

With textbooks costing hundreds of dollars, students should keep their eyes on their bookbags to avoid becoming victim to one of Delta’s only crime problems – larceny of textbooks.

According to Delta College Public Safety Lt. Steven Witzke, property larceny is probably the biggest crime at Delta College, especially now.

“Larceny of any property is high, but larceny of books this time of year is a high-demand item because (people) can get good dollars for them,” Witzke said. “Somebody sees a book sitting on a ledge, whether it’s for 5 minutes, 15 minutes or whatever timeframe and it comes up missing the chances of recovering the book aren’t very good.”

According to Witzke, the Delta College bookstore has no way of determining whether or not the person returning the book was the actual owner.

“Unless someone can catch the person reselling the book back to the bookstore it is very hard to recover,” Witzke said.

This time of year some people roam around Delta just searching for unattended books. In no time they can easily collect 10 books or so, which can easily translate into a few hundred dollars.

“Larceny is our crime of opportunity,” Witzke said. “Most times you won’t be ripped off, but (people) wouldn’t normally commit larceny, but this time of year with the holidays and demand for more money people need extra cash to buy gifts and other things, some people give into temptation.”

“People get teased by temptation when they see books left unattended. People who would normally not do something wrong would give into temptation.”

“Different morals and different standards for everybody,” Witzke said. “Typically this is the time of year where we have a number of thefts increase.”

Witzke suggests that students never leave books, or anything of value for that matter, unattended for an extended period of time.

“People should always make sure their valuables are within sight and never leave anything unattended,” Witzke said. “People shouldn’t go to the Commons, put their stuff down at a table then go get their food because then we will have a lot of reported crimes.”

Witzke believes a bookbag that can be carried around the shoulders is a very good idea.

“You never know who is going to be the person that might decide they need the extra dollars. The biggest thing is to keep your property in a safe environment, especially this time of year.”

According to Witzke, if anyone is a victim of larceny and wants to press charges they are asked to make a report with Public Safety as soon as possible because the chances of making a recovery decreases with time.

If anyone finds a book left unattended they are asked to bring it to Public Safety so the person who lost it can identify the book, show their college photo ID and pick it up.