OUTAGAMIE COUNTY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – With just two weeks to go until Christmas Eve, boxes of goods for families and loved ones are quickly arriving to people’s doorsteps.
But a growing issue all over America is thieves stealing those packages.
A 2024 study by SafeWise estimates more than 120 million packages were taken from porches across the U.S. in 2023, up one million from the year before. It also finds “porch pirates” cost Americans nearly $16 billion last year.
“In this case, nobody is trying to create an opportunity for theft,” said Aaron Zemlock, a criminal justice instructor at Fox Valley Technical College, who previously served as a police officer in the city of Menasha. “But it just becomes a natural opportunity because it’s just sitting — valuable items, you know, sitting out on the porch for anybody to quick pop out and grab.”
While Appleton police didn’t have exact data available, they say this time of year, they do see an increase in package theft calls.
“Sometimes, we hear from people that, ‘Hey, that package wasn’t there for more than a few minutes and it was gone.’ Or people say, ‘I was gone all day at work, I didn’t even remember that I had a package coming.’ They don’t even remember that the package is even at their house at all and they don’t notice the theft has happened even until weeks, sometimes later, which makes it very difficult for us to be able to investigate that,” said Appleton Police Lt. Meghan Cash.
Law enforcement and others,like the Better Business Bureau, have some tips for those expecting packages at their door.
Those include using a home security camera or a video doorbell, or shipping packages straight to a store or drop-off locations like Amazon lockers.
“Another suggestion we tell people is if you need to have it delivered to your workplace, do that,” said Cash.
Police also encourage anyone to speak up if they see anything suspicious.
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