Car stolen, 6 others broken into in Needham; police seek video footage

Police in Needham, Massachusetts, issued a public safety alert on Saturday after at least six cars were broken into, with another vehicle stolen.

Needham police say the break-ins happened overnight in one of the town's neighborhoods, and that all of the cars were unlocked. It all happened sometime between 12:30 a.m. and 4 a.m. Saturday. The cars were targeted on Clarke, Glendale and Forest roads, all part of the same neighborhood. The other impacted street is Winding River, just a short distance away.

The vehicle that was stolen has since been recovered, and another vehicle was found in Needham that had been stolen from a neighboring city, police say.

"It is imperative that you call us right away if you see something," the police department wrote in its Facebook post.

A number of residents describe the neighborhood as friendly, peaceful and quiet but say this incident has them thinking twice about safety.

"We don't lock our car doors, we don't lock our house doors," one Needham man said of how safe they usually feel.

"This hasn't happened before so this should be a wake-up call," said Jim Russell, whose neighbor was targeted along with a few others in the immediate area.

"The good weather seems to bring people outside and when you’re outside and you’re bored, you do things," said Kevin Conway.

Some who spoke to us on Sunday said they hadn't heard about the car break-ins. Others who were targeted didn't want to speak on camera.

Scott Shiffres says he learned about the break-ins through an email sent by a neighbor who wanted to make everyone aware of what happened.

"A lot of kids in the neighborhood so you don’t wanna have any of that going around. We’re in the garage. Sometimes we leave our cars in the driveway and we’ve probably made a mistake here and there unlocked but we try to lock as much as possible," he said.

Shiffres adds that he's thankful his car wasn't in sight when the suspects were out. His next-door neighbor had credit cards stolen and a driver's license. He's hopeful it's only a matter of time before police catch whoever did this.

"You want to make sure everything is safe in the neighborhood," he said. "We’ve got our Ring cam, it’s pretty new for us so it’s nice to be able to see whatever we can see but obviously it only catches so much. It didn’t catch what was going on there."

Police are asking anyone with video footage who may have seen suspicious people walking around their driveway to reach out to the public safety center at 781-444-1212. They're also reminding residents to lock their vehicles at night, bringing any valuables inside, and to always report any suspicious activity.