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Crime Alert: Gas station carjackings on the rise in suburbs across Greater Cleveland

Posted at 4:40 PM, Feb 09, 2017
and last updated 2017-02-09 16:41:28-05

How often do you fill up your tank? This is something you many want to think about every time you do. 

Cars are being stolen at gas stations every day, and police tell News 5, it's happening everywhere. 

There have been recent reports in Cleveland, Brookpark, Rocky River, Fairview Park, Beachwood, Olmsted Falls, and Euclid. 

In Euclid, disturbing surveillance video from the Sunoco gas station shows a carjacking from February 6th. You can see a man casually walk up to a gray minivan, he opens the door and aggressively pulls and throws the driver, a 72-year-old woman, out of the car. Then he quickly drives away.

Police say she wasn't injured, but they are still looking for her van. 

In Rocky River, thieves got into a man's car and drove off, while he was distracted, just outside filling his tires.

"You have a level of comfort, you think it can't happen here, but it does," Lieutenant Paul Shepard, with Fairview Park Police, told News 5. 

His advice?

"Shut your car off! Take your keys with you," he said.