Zhung Kong Robbed?

[djtimmy77]

If you actually look at the numbers the crime rate per person is a little higher than Denver's. Probably right on par with South Florida. So maybe it doesn't pale in comparison, but I do know is there are significantly more shootings/murders here.

Now consider that most of the serious crime (Robberies, violent crime) is not against tourists.

Also consider that median wages in Denver are 7 times as much as Bonaire.

I am not saying that the crime is OK....I am happy that the Bonaire Police are getting more serious, however the sky is not falling. I am not fearful to go to Bonaire.

Now hurry, go inside your house and lock your doors.

 

[Mike]

I do lock my doors as I'm sure you do. And you're again typical of the same tired arguments over and over again rationalizations about crime.

You might not be fearful of Boniare today, but the trend is higher and higher crime rates, the next escalation is coming. Bonaire's still ignoring the breeding ground of their criminal element which is the petty crime against tourist divers. The young nefarious age into mature criminals as they cut their teeth on tourist crimes and continue from there. Bonaire is now reaping what it has sowed over the years. Police have ignored and chastised victims of petty crimes who are tourist divers for years, I say enjoy it now that the criminals are turning up the heat on the locals. They are getting what they deserve for letting tourists entertain and keep their criminals happy all these years.

It was only a matter of time for any place who's crime deterrent against criminals breaking into locked cars by breaking the windows is to tell people not to lock their cars got what it deserved. The absurdity of this policy has always amazed me and even though it's taken time for the chickens to come back to roost, they certainly have shown that letting criminals commit crimes undeterred wasn't really the best choice.

 

[boat sju]

to tell people not to lock their cars

I don't really have a lot of interest in these "crime on Bonaire" threads anymore, but I do feel that it should be said that Bonaire is not the only island with this warning. I saw it on a Turks and Caicos rental car site too.

 

[deco_martini]

Bonaire has a ton of unattended vehicles parked in unmonitored places. The petty crime problem is a predictable outcome. It is almost natural. These crimes of opportunity will always happen. We leave nothing in our truck but tanks and water.

I wouldn't leave an ipod in the passenger seat of a locked car in a monitored parking lot in the US.

That said, the armed robberies are a new trend and still confined to locals. However, it is a disturbing trend. The new measures being taken of traffic checkpoints? Iduno.

Stay tuned here: https://www.facebook.com/pages/forum-bonaire/134931953259878

The results from the first checkpoint are in, and they just got code violations.

 

[boat sju]

No more, having a beer on the way back from Rincon.

 

[Mike]

The traffic check points have nothing to do with cracking down on petty crimes or burglary

This traffic control is the first step in increasing awareness of all road users to the new Traffic Regulations which will soon be introduced on Bonaire.
Checks included: the condition of the vehicles, the safety of small children, insurance papers and the road tax for the first half of 2014.

Stop the madness and simply patrol the island, it's basically one road, drive up it, drive down it, make a police presence known and watch petty thefts at dive sites all but disappear.

In the US, when eye balls are open such as something as simple as the neighborhood watch program crime drops on average by 25%, this isn't rocket science. Criminals prey on easy targets the easier the police make it on them such as zero patrolling the easier the opportunist find it to commit crimes with no fear of being caught. Duh, nothing it takes a genius to figure out.

 

[deco_martini]

No more, having a beer on the way back from Rincon.

The things we give up for "security".

 

[Hintermann]

If you actually look at the numbers the crime rate per person is a little higher than Denver's. Probably right on par with South Florida. So maybe it doesn't pale in comparison, but I do know is there are significantly more shootings/murders here.

Now consider that most of the serious crime (Robberies, violent crime) is not against tourists.

Also consider that median wages in Denver are 7 times as much as Bonaire.

I am not saying that the crime is OK....I am happy that the Bonaire Police are getting more serious, however the sky is not falling. I am not fearful to go to Bonaire.

Now hurry, go inside your house and lock your doors.

With due respect, I do not think that this sort of reasoning has much value.

To some extent, most of us do not have a choice about the crime rate or anything else where we live, whether it is Denver, Soth Florida, Bonaire or Timbuktu; we have to take the good with the bad. But we do have a choice of where we spend our hard-earned money to get a well-deserved break and if a particular place is less appealing because of local crime, it is perfectly natural for some people wanting to stay away irresepctive of the other attractions of that place.

The other thing is that during "normal life" in our hometowns, there is a certain abount of almost subconscious street wisdom that previals due to familiarity. As a result, a lot of us instinctively avoid going to certain places at certain times or take due precautions if we have to go, often without even thinking about it. But while on a holiday, we are out to enjoy ourselves to the best extent possible and that is where the guard might be let down. Those petty and not-so-petty criminals know that only too well.

 

[djtimmy77]

Well to be fair I don't think your reasoning or Mike's has much value either. haha

BTW last year in Bonaire we saw patrols up and down the roads to the dive sites as Mike suggests.

Going on holiday should be fun, yes, but you shouldn't be stupid.

 

[drrich2]

Every place has a crime level, and a general level of caution people exercise. Someone mentioned locking their doors at home. There are places in the U.S. where many people don't; rural settings, for instance. I saw a documentary on t.v. where it seemed a number of Canadians didn't. And some people don't lock their cars much when they're out.

But many of us lock our home & car doors. But don't have bars on our windows, or have 2 or 3 locks on the door. But in some places, people do.

Shore diving generally means leaving a vehicle unguarded for about an hour, and even if the user returned and 'caught' the perp., the user would probably be encumbered with dive gear (e.g.: weights, fins, etc...) and easy out-ran. In any scenario where locals learn to identify which vehicles are dive tourist's, and know the prospective victims will be out of the country within a week, you have some risk for vehicle break ins.

In Bonaire, there is a well-established workflow for leaving nothing of value in your rental truck while diving, and the windows down & doors unlocked so thieves can see there's nothing much to steal, and this system works well for and to the satisfaction of legions of divers. There are fairly rare reports of battery or gas theft, and that is another story entirely, but it seems quite uncommon as yet.

There are people who, for whatever reason, want to take a cooler of drinks or sandwiches, or a change of clothes or a 'land camera,' and leave it in the truck while diving, truck locked, with no substantial risk of anyone breaking into the truck & stealing their stuff. Well, you can't do that! Not without some risk. That's just not how it works there. People who insist on hauling that stuff create more potential reward for thieves.

I suspect shore diving in other locales could yield similar results, at least if the locals are very familiar with it. Curacao comes to mind. Wonder about St. Croix?

When my wife went to orientation at a college, the security guys tips on being safe on campus made Bonaire sound downright carefree!

Richard.