A mom in Columbus, Ohio, is frustrated with how the criminal justice system is treating her teenage son — because it’s not being harsh enough with him.
Tiffany Hammons said her 17-year-old son has stolen multiple cars and crashed some of them, and that even when police catch him, they just bring him home to her.
“I’ve been begging and pleading – please arrest him, lock him up, do something that’s going to make him pay for the things that he’s out here doing,” Hammons told WBNS.
In addition to the theft and property damage, Hammons said her son doesn’t even have a driver’s license.
Columbus, a city of about 900,000 residents, has seen thousands of car thefts already this year — so many that officials have asked parents to step up and keep a better eye on their children in an effort to combat the crime.
“We’re trying, but once they’re here and they leave again, then what?” Hammons said in response. “What are we supposed to do?”
Hammons said it’s the city that needs to step up and do more, not only for her son’s sake, but to protect the people he endangers with his criminal behavior.
“Since he’s left, that I know of, he’s crashed five cars,” she told WBNS. “And I reported each and every one that I know of, and he’s still out there.”
“I’ve done almost everything I could and it’s turning him against me, he’s going the opposite way and doing what he wants to do,” she said, “which is turning to the streets.”
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“I think him seeing that nothing is being done is giving him more of an adrenaline rush to go back out and do it again,” Hammons added.
In just the first eight months of 2023, WBNS reported, 7,330 cars had been reported stolen in Columbus, with just over half of those being Kias and Hyundais.
According to system software company Cox Automotive, those two brands together account for only about 10 percent of the U.S. car market.
You can watch the entire report from WBNS here:
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Columbus has a higher crime rate than most other cities of a similar size, according to various sources.
According to FBI statistics analyzed by Neighborhood Scout, Columbus has a “total crime index” of five, indicating that the city is safer than only 5 percent of neighborhoods throughout the country.
U.S. News & World Report, using similar data augmented by other sources, noted that violent crime in Columbus was lower than average, but property crime more than made up for that, leaving Columbus with a higher overall crime rate compared to similarly sized metropolitan areas.
