Rising car thefts and a shocking holiday choice for troubled youths in Townsville
Townsville is bracing to see a car theft spike in the lead-up to the holidays, an annual trend that some believe is partly fuelled by troubled kids who want to spend Christmas in Cleveland.
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Townsville is bracing to see a car theft spike in the lead-up to the holidays, an annual trend that some believe is partly fuelled by troubled kids who want to spend Christmas in Cleveland.
Police data shows the number of car thefts in Townsville has spiked every year in October in the lead-up to Christmas since 2018.
It comes after the number of unlawful use of motor vehicle offences across the city jumped by about 70 per cent this October, with 170 reported compared to 99 in September.
In 2022, October was Townsville’s worst month for car thefts, with 194 offences reported.
This troubling trend has seen law enforcement under the pump as the festive season draws closer, but some believe there may be a grim reason behind it.
Police sources say they’ve often had several interactions with kids who actually want to be in Cleveland Youth Detention Centre over the Christmas holidays rather than at home.
They say some children may be fleeing abuse and find solace within the walls of the detention centre, where they can be with their mates, enjoy decent meals, and even receive presents on Christmas Day.
A recent incident in Cranbrook brought this issue into sharp focus.
On Tuesday, a young girl could be heard pleading with the police, saying, “Take me to Cleveland, not the watch house.”
The police were there responding to reports of youths throwing rocks at cars and causing property damage outside the Kmart store at 8.30am, a time when most kids her age should be on their way to school.
Herbert MP Phil Thompson said he wasn’t surprised kids wanted to go back to Cleveland and that he’d happily go there for a holiday himself if it weren’t full of young criminals.
“There’s a nice pool, basketball courts and TVs in every room,” he said.
“There’s pizza nights and presents at Christmas — it’s a nice place to stay.”
However, he also expressed concerns about the underlying issues leading young people to such choices.
It comes after Mayor Jenny Hill recently said she “wouldn’t leave a dog” in some of the troubled homes juvenile offenders in Townsville come from.
“(The parents) think being drunk all day and letting children sit in dirty nappies is a great way to go, and you’ve got these kids growing up hating everyone,” she said.
She highlighted the importance of addressing the roots of the city’s youth crime problem rather than just dealing with the consequences.
Phil Thompson echoed these sentiments, emphasising that many young offenders in Townsville hail from extremely challenging backgrounds.
He argued that the government needed to take a more proactive approach, focusing on early intervention starting at the prenatal stage of a child’s life to stop them turning to crime.
“But when it comes to committing crimes, they’re not going into people’s homes and stealing bread … they going in to steal a car and there needs to be punishment for bad behaviour,” he said.
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Originally published as Rising car thefts and a shocking holiday choice for troubled youths in Townsville
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