Police sound alarm on dangerous 'jugging' robbery trend sweeping across America
As surveillance footage of an increasingly popular violent street crime has surfaced from South Carolina, police are warning Americans of the disturbing trend.
The crime is known as "jugging," a type of robbery in which criminals surveil banks and ATMs, watching for victims who withdraw large sums of money. When those victims finish their transactions, the "juggers" will usually follow them to a secondary location, where they will rob the victims, often inside their vehicles.
"Jugging rhymes with mugging, it's spread from Texas to South Carolina," Fox News Senior Correspondent Steve Harrigan said on "America Reports" on Friday. "Some police there weren't even sure what the word meant until the crime started happening in their own districts. Law enforcement warns that it could be over in a flash."
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In the footage, captured on April 26, a man can be seen struggling inside the front passenger area of a red truck, before jumping out of that vehicle and into a silver SUV. The SUV then speeds off, and it is captured from different surveillance angles fleeing the parking lot.
Cpl. Cecilio Reyes of the Mauldin, South Carolina, Police Department explained how the crime typically plays out.
"They are scoping, and they will watch you as you're either coming in or going out of the bank, or watch you do ATM withdrawals, seeing how much you're getting cash wise," Reyes said.
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Harrigan described a wave of jugging arrests in Texas, before the practice began spreading to North and South Carolina.
"In one place in South Carolina, a landscaping business owner went in a bank unaware that he was being observed, took out his weekly payroll, stopped at a gas station for a soda, and two juggers – they usually work in teams – pulled up alongside his Chevy, broke through the window and made off with what his entire payroll was, $6,000."
Harrigan also reported that the Texas legislature is working to make jugging a specific felony, with harsher penalties than simple robbery.