Drugs and video games a dangerous mix for young hoons

Video games championing stealing cars and breaking the law are inspiring a generation of impressionable youth to commit crimes, police say.

Youth offenders inspired by video games could be behind a surge in car crime, a Boroondara detective says.

Young hoons fuelled by drugs and video games are running rampant across Melbourne and putting their lives and other road users at risk, say police.

Kew Detective Senior Sergeant Daryl Cullen said car crime was on the rise across the city’s inner and outer suburbs, with thefts of and from cars recently skyrocketing 40 per cent in Boroondara.

Hooligans — often impressionable youth inspired in part by video games that glorified car theft and speeding — would break into cars to steal their contents and look for keys, he said.

If a spare set was inside the owner could kiss their car goodbye, he said, with the crims often then taking it for a joy ride, leading to other offending such as petrol drive offs, speeding and street robberies.

Worse still, many of the thugs had drugs in their system, meaning their decision making and driving skills were compromised, he said.

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“Over the last three months there’s been a marked increase in this type of crime. We’ve got a dedicated team from Boroondara CIU investigating,” Sen-Sgt Cullen said.

“By the end of the night they’ll all want a stolen car to drive; it’s the fast and the furious.”

While the issue of rising car crime was Melbourne wide, he said Boroondara’s lack of off-street parking made the municipality’s cars easy pickings for opportunistic thieves.

“Again we highlight if valuables aren’t left in the car, then people will stop stealing them,” Sen-Sgt Cullen said.

More than 1330 car break ins were recorded across the municipality by police in the year to March, up from 1292 the year before according to the latest crime figures.

The Crime Statistics Agency data released last week (June 20) also noted 214 car thefts were investigated by police in the same period compared to 208 the year prior.