Three months after St. Thomas police warned of a rise in vehicle entries, they say the numbers have come down. There were 44 reported in September, and five in October as of the 23rd.
The figures come from a police release on Monday, October 26th. It also gives a count for the year so far: 154 reported vehicle entries in 2026, more than double the roughly 73 reported in all of 2025.
This year’s jump ended a long decline. Statistics Canada’s crime figures show thefts from vehicles in St. Thomas falling every year from a peak of 243 in 2020 to 84 in 2025, the fewest since 2015. Those figures use Statistics Canada’s own crime categories, so they can’t be set beside the police count of 154. What they show is the direction: before this year, the problem had been shrinking for five years.
In September, police were not publishing a running total. As LocVox reported then, the service’s daily media releases described close to 100 vehicle entries between July 7th and September 23rd. Those releases do not list every case, so that count was only ever a floor. The 154 is the police service’s own number.
The release presents the drop as a result of a coordinated push by patrol officers and two investigative teams. General Patrol investigated 99 vehicle entries, leading to 59 criminal charges. The Street Crime Unit and the Property Crime Unit investigated another 20, leading to 15 charges. That is 74 charges in all, and the release counts charges, not people.
The warning police put out on July 29th said that in most cases the vehicles “had been left unlocked and showed no signs of forced entry.” Police summed up their advice in one line: “Lock it or lose it.” As LocVox reported in August, the entries kept coming in the days after that warning.
A quieter October does not change the advice. Police still ask everyone to lock their vehicles, take valuables out and report anything suspicious. To report a vehicle entry, call St. Thomas police at 519-631-1224.
Sources: St. Thomas Police Service release, October 26, 2026 · St. Thomas Police Service release, July 29, 2026
By Anthony Zruna · About the LocVox Newsroom
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