Quick response leads to ‘car jammer’ bust

On 5 August, Parkview police’s Sergeant John Seete and Constable Ephraim Maluleke received an alert about a suspected car jammer. They immediately rushed to the scene and arrived just in time to arrest the suspect, said police spokesperson Sergeant Lloyd Ramovha.

According to security officials stationed at the parking lot, the suspect had allegedly been spotted inside a vehicle that was parked in the lot, and had tried to run away after being seen inside the car.

Upon his arrest, police recovered suspected stolen valuable items, which included a wallet, an iPad and sunglasses. A car jamming device was also recovered from the suspect, who is expected to appear at the Hillbrow Magistrate’s Court soon.

Ramovha urged community members to be vigilant and exercise the necessary caution, as jamming device seems to be a phenomenon regardless of make of car.

“One way of preventing falling victim to this, is to simply physically check… [the] doors after locking with a remote, and also to look around after parking a vehicle, as this might indicate to the would-be thieves that you are alert,” he said.

Remote jamming is common throughout the country, thieves monitor motorists in parking lots and as a motorist presses the lock button on their remote to lock their car, the thieves press their own remotes which operate on the same frequency. The signal gets jammed as a result, which prevents the car from being locked.

Despite wide media coverage on the issue, car jamming is still on the rise. Many insurance companies don’t cover theft out of a motor vehicle if there are no visible signs of forced entry, which is the case with remote jammers.

Has the alarm system on your vehicle ever been jammed? How did it happen and where?

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