CAR-JACKING - BEATING THE CAR-JACKERS

The rise of 'Car-Jacking', the kind of smash and grab attack motorists are vulnerable to when actually in their cars, is an unwelcome facet of modern motoring.

These unwelcome events usually always take place when the vehicle has been stationary at traffic lights. Police in the United Kingdom do not currently collect statistics on car-jacking attacks or smash and grab attacks. Such attacks are normally classed as either robbery or theft from a motor vehicle. However, a number of hot spot smash and grab areas have been identified in different parts of the country: Salford, Newcastle, Liverpool and parts of West London have all witnessed such attacks in recent years.

Motoring organisations are advising motorists who are fearful of becoming victims of car-jacking to think about having protective film applied to their car windows. Such protective film prevents people outside of the vehicle from seeing inside, reducing the likelihood for opportunistic thieves attacking cars for their contents.

Protective film has in the past largely been used for cosmetic purposes in vehicles, either as a widow tint or to cool the car and its occupants from the sunlight. Recent improvements in the film, which is largely used in South Africa and North America, mean that it now offers real benefits from external attacks.

As well as preventing thieves from seeing a vehicle's contents, it can, in many cases, strengthen widows to such an extent that they become 'bullet-resistant', preventing criminals from being able to reach goods or to threaten the driver so that they can steal the car. The film also prevents the vehicles glass from shattering and causing injury.

As Edmund King, President of the AA, observes, "The recent rise in horrific car-jacking attacks has highlighted an urgent need for motorists to be aware of ways to protect thems...