Kia Fever Continues in Cleveland

Stolen cars and rampant shootings are heating up the summer.

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Back in March, the City of Cleveland sued Kia and Hyundai for not installing industry-standard anti-theft technology in certain models of their cars, claiming it led to a rash of stolen vehicles. According to the Cleveland mayor’s website, “between October and December 2022, a reported 1,203 Hyundai and Kia vehicles were stolen in Cleveland. For December alone, vehicle theft of Hyundais and Kias accounted for 65 percent of total vehicle theft in the city.”

Even before lawsuits were filed by Cleveland and other U.S. cities, Kia and Hyundai had been working with law enforcement agencies after a TikTok challenge encouraged stealing 2012 and newer models that did not have immobilizers. In the spring, the manufacturers announced a plan to add anti-theft software in existing cars for free.

Unfortunately, thieves continue to steal Kia, Hyundai and other vehicles in and around Cleveland. A man in Lakewood, an inner-ring suburb of Cleveland, recently had his Kia stolen for the second time. He told a local news channel that he had installed a camera and an alert device in the car after he got it back the first time, but that didn’t deter thieves from stealing it again.

“They know exactly what they’re doing,” the man said about the car thieves. “They smash out the back window, crawl in. And it was, literally, not even a minute” before his car was stolen.

On the other side of town, in Cleveland Heights, police received reports of at least seven stolen or damaged Kias and Hyundais over a two-day period. In just about every instance, the windows of the cars had been smashed.

The City of Cleveland has seen an 85% increase in stolen cars since June 2022. Now police are noticing that many of these stolen cars are being used to commit violent crimes, including smash-and-grabs and robberies.

Cleveland is not the only city that continues to see a spate of car thefts (Buffalo is averaging 12 stolen vehicles a day), but Cleveland is also experiencing an alarming number of shootings and homicides. Add to that the fact that the city is short about 200 police officers, and you’ve got a perfect storm that is angering residents and local political leaders.

A “mass shooting” in Downtown Cleveland

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In the early hours of July 9, 25-year-old Jaylon Jennings allegedly fired a 9 mm handgun at a group of people leaving a bar in Downtown Cleveland. Nine people were injured, including a woman who says she was shot in both feet. She told a local news channel she wasn’t sure if the gunman had targeted people or if it was a random attack. (You can watch video of the events unfolding here.)

The Associated Press provided a few more details: “Police allege in an arrest warrant filed Tuesday that the shooting occurred after Jennings saw several people inside one of the bars and retrieved a firearm from the trunk of his vehicle in a parking lot across the street. He then fired into the crowd despite police officers being nearby, according to authorities.”

On July 15, police arrested another man, Kevin Raul Del Valle-Salaman, 24, who is said to have driven the car in which the shooter retrieved the gun. The car happened to be a Kia Sportage.

Mass shootings garner the attention of the media and the public. They are big news stories that unfortunately sometimes include many casualties. Mass shootings bring up renewed calls for stricter gun laws, better mental healthcare, and so on. They also churn up concerns about Second Amendment rights and the need to defend oneself from dangerous people.

The Cleveland mass shooting differs from the ones we typically see on the news in a few ways. The alleged shooter used a 9 mm handgun, not a semiautomatic rifle, the weapon-of-choice for a lot of mass shooters. To date, there is no known manifesto or anything that would suggest the suspect had a deep-seated reason for carrying out the shooting. Also, the alleged shooter in this instance had at least one accomplice, while most of the mass shootings across the country have involved lone gunmen.

Many other shootings have been taking place in and around the city for several months. These get nothing more than 30 seconds on a local news channel, possibly because they involve one person shooting another rather than a large group. They aren’t “big news.” But they are happening with enough frequency that they can’t be ignored.

Brian Bitzan of Broadview Heights, Ohio, was killed on July 12 during an apparent drug deal on Cleveland’s east side. On July 14, Theodore Broadus, 18, was fatally shot in the head while in a car with three other people who immediately fled the scene. The next day, Rachel Daniels, 33, was shot in the face and killed during an apparent argument in a Cleveland apartment. On July 16, a 4-year-old boy was shot three times by his 15-year-old brother. The little boy suffered a broken arm and had part of his stomach removed due to his injuries. The older brother was taken to the hospital for a psychiatric evaluation.

This is just some of the “street-level violence” that has been taking place in Cleveland. Almost every day, someone is shot or stabbed. It could be during an argument, a drug deal gone bad or a drive-by. Details tend to be sketchy. Suspects are not always identified or detained. The police shortage in Cleveland makes finding suspects that much more difficult.

A Crime Pandemic.

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The violence has angered Cleveland council members, local pastors and citizens who don’t feel safe in their own neighborhoods. Councilman Mike Polensek says there’s a “crime pandemic” in Cleveland. During a recent council meeting, Polensek noted that there have already been more than 100 homicides in the city this year.

Noticeably absent from the city council meeting was Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb and members of his cabinet. “It’s indefensible,” council member Blaine Griffin said about the administration’s no-show. “What keeps me up are the young men and women dying daily in the city. People feel like nobody cares.”

For his part, Mayor Bibb says the city’s public safety leadership “will be meeting with the FBI, the U.S. Marshals and ATF to identify additional aggressive enforcement tactics to cut down on violent crime.” Bibb says he is also working “around the clock” to find incentives that will attract more police officers.

Finding the Root Causes of Violence.

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Why is all of this violence happening in the first place? The Greater Cleveland United Pastors in Mission (UPM) held a news conference recently to address the crime surge. “There are too many guns on the streets, and too many people with criminal records on the streets,” according to the organization’s written statement, which was read aloud during the news conference. “There is also a shortage of values about what is right, what is wrong, what is acceptable, what should be condoned, and what is condemned.”

The pastors noted that a variety of factors may be causing the high level of crime, including economic and social. “We must call on our local, state and national leaders to call it, if you will, a national health crisis. It’s destroying families, it’s destroying churches, it’s destroying mosques, it’s destroying synagogues, it’s destroying restaurants and it’s destroying organizations in and around the city.”

Violence “is a disease that has to be dealt with and ultimately eliminated,” the UPM added. “It takes all of us to deal with the problem of violence in what we used to call our neighborhoods.”

When it comes to car thefts, criminals tend to be in their teens or early twenties. In February, two 14-year-old boys were arrested in Cleveland for stealing Kias and Hyundais. One of the juveniles supposedly stole more than 24 cars over two months. In June, nine teens were arrested in Lorain, Ohio for stealing more than 50 Kias and Hyundais.

Blaming car companies for not installing anti-theft devices and TikTok for allowing the Kia Challenge to go viral detracts from the fact that these crimes were committed by people, often teenagers, who chose to accept the challenge and steal the cars. They weren’t forced to do so. Stopping the rash of car thefts and carjackings involves finding out what makes people commit these crimes and how to make them stop.

More parental involvement and community resources might help. Effectively punishing criminals through the legal system but also rehabilitating them through a variety of programs would also go a long way to lowering these crimes.

Shootings, stabbings and other violent crimes span a wider age group. From the 15-year-old who is said to have shot his brother to people in their 30s, 40s and 50s being arrested for injuring or murdering others, these perpetrators seem to have easy access to weapons, whether legal or illegal. In most cases, stealing is not a motivating factor, but anger or revenge often is.

Again, what can be done to stop this violence? You could sue the gun manufacturers, but there will always be a way for someone to get a gun if he really wants one. Stricter gun laws could make a difference, although some of the weapons used are obtained illegally.

Finding out the reason behind the desire to hurt or kill people and developing tactics to alter behaviors sounds like an idealistic way to curb the violence, but it is also the best means to create long-term changes.

Who’s going to do this? Local pastors want to, but they need help. Ordinary citizens don’t feel they have the power to get involved. City government is making some effort, but it’s not nearly as fast as this crisis calls for.

Another note on this subject: The majority of these violent crimes take place in primarily black neighborhoods. We have to ask if race is a factor in any of this. If it is, what then? Mayor Bibb is a Black man, as are several members of city council. But if they can’t all come together at a meeting and discuss the issue, how much progress can we expect?

On a positive note, after the angry comments from city council, the mayor’s office and council members did meet a few days later to discuss crime. After that meeting, the mayor’s office released this statement: “Keeping the public safe and providing residents with good quality services are the two most important aspects of city government.  Our residents need and deserve this.  We all agree on this baseline.” No specific details were given on efforts to increase public safety.

Greater Cleveland is often the underdog when it comes to sports and community revitalization. It has slowly been making headway as a world-class area that stays true to its working-class roots. The increase in crime mars those efforts.

For citizens who have been victims of crime or who fear crime in their neighborhoods, recent incidents have them scared but also annoyed. “Whoever it is, you’re kind of a piece of crap, just shooting freely into a whole crowd of people,” commented the woman who was shot in Downtown Cleveland on July 9. “But my message to this generation is, put the guns down and stop all the violence. It’s not even necessary.”