NICB Posted Steep Decline in Scrap Metal Thefts

SEATTLE (Scrap Monster): The latest report on metal theft insurance claims published by the National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB) suggests decline in U.S. scrap metal theft incidents in 2018, compared with the year before that. Also, copper cable thefts continued to account for majority of theft claims during the year.

According to NICB Report, a total of 2,887 metal theft claims were reported in 2018. This compares with the theft claims of 3,017 reported in 2017. Over the year, metal theft claims recorded a decline by 4%. The review of 5,904 insurance claims during the two-year period from 1^st January, 2017 to 31^st December, 2018 revealed that 95% were related to copper theft incidents.

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The state with most theft claims was New Jersey. A total of 570 claims were reported by that state. New Jersey was closely followed by Pennsylvania with 488 thefts. The other states to witness most thefts were Ohio (410 thefts), New York (405 thefts) and Illinois (333 thefts), the NICB Report said. In accordance with the rankings based on the number of claims per 100,000 in population, the top five states were Connecticut (13.8), New Jersey (11.6), Rhode Island (10.6), Delaware (9.2), and Maryland (7.3). 

NICB Report stated that vigilance is the best deterrent to scrap metal theft. It urged public to be more vigilant and to report any suspicious or unusual activity around homes or businesses to local law enforcement agencies.