Armed carjackings in Oakland increased 115 percent over the past 12 months, police said Wednesday.
The number of carjackings in the past year was up to 200 as of Sunday, compared with 93 from June 1, 2019 to May 31, 2020. In addition, more than six have occurred just since Monday of this week, according to police.
Those numbers were reported as police on Friday announced the arrest of three people in connection with carjackings in Oakland and other East Bay cities and an attempted homicide in Dublin.
Multiple suspects are often involved in the carjackings, according to police. Most of the carjackings appear to be crimes of opportunity where the suspects use the vehicles to then commit other crimes such as home robberies or thefts of personal items, police reported.
In some cases, armed suspects are approaching victims at stop lights and stop signs and suspects are crashing a vehicle into the victim’s vehicle before stealing the victim’s car, police said.
When the victim gets out to exchange information with the suspect, the suspect steals the vehicle. In some cases, suspects have broken a window to the victim’s car to try to steal belongings such as purses, laptops, or cellphones that are on a seat.