Walnut woes and identity thefts

OK, this is getting downright surreal. 

Gonzalez had a short piece (paywalled) today describing a 2011-ish study done by this organization, in which League City was ranked as the "68th safest" city among 430 cities of population exceeding 75,000 that were assessed. 

That may not sound very impressive, but it puts us in approximately the top 16% of American cities in the size range assessed.  I'll take it. 

It looks like a lot of crime, but it's not when compared to the rest of our society.

RecordsPedia indicated that they'd prefer this content to be embedded as a frame, but I can't seem to adjust their HTML sequence to display properly in Blogger's layout, so here is a low-res screengrab. 

And in fact, very little crime tends to occur here in Centerpointe.  I've noted this previously when I've done routine crime summaries. 

But here's the thing: Of the crime that does occur in Centerpointe, a disproportionate share of it seems to occur on just one street:  Walnut Pointe.

This phenomenon has fascinated the hell out of me on more than one previous occasion.

Screengrab from this November 29, 2012 post which, in turn, referenced this June 19, 2012 post.  All of this related back to my original March 30, 2011 post on broken windows theory and the fact that parking cars on sidewalks is illegal, not to mention ignorant, inconsiderate, and un-neighborly. 

According to broken windows theory, one illegal activity sets the stage for additional illegal activities to follow.  Consistency does not equal proof, and there's a bit of chicken-and-egg effect tied up in all of this, but I find it to be a worthy theory - one that has some compelling real-world evidence of its efficacy. 

I usually retrieve most of our reported crime statistics from a website called Crime Reports.  They've changed their format recently such that only 30 days of data can be displayed at one time, rather than a full six months, which was a very efficient way of displaying data.  But going back to late August 2012, which is apparently when I did my last look-see, here's what got reported to that source:

Something heretofore unreported in the mix:  Identity theft, with these three reported incidents on Walnut Pointe.
Screengrab courtesy of Crime Reports.  See next image for corresponding details. 

I distilled those three incidents down to this list.  Two of the addresses are the same, but the thefts took place on different days, so there may have been more than one perpetrator. 

Assault on Walnut Pointe.
Screengrab courtesy of Crime Reports. 

A theft on Walnut Pointe.
Screengrab courtesy of Crime Reports. 

During approximately this same five-month timeframe, what else reportedly happened in Centerpointe?


Someone reportedly busted into a car on Almond Pointe.
Screengrab courtesy of Crime Reports.

Someone reportedly snatched from an unlocked vehicle on Willow Pointe.
Screengrab courtesy of Crime Reports.

And someone reportedly lifted an identity on Harvard Pointe, which is one of the only crimes reported here in Section 9 during our three-year existence.
Screengrab courtesy of Crime Reports.

So in this approximately five-month period of time, Centerpointe had one criminal incident reported on Harvard Pointe, one on Willow Pointe, one on Almond Pointe... and five on Walnut Pointe. 

But here is where I will veer away from a Walnut Pointe focus because these identity theft reports are very concerning. 

I don't yet have any details as to how they might have happened, but here's what concerns me: 

Back in late November and again in December, I talked about serious problems my family was having with the League City Post Office.  Our mail went missing and then mysteriously re-appeared from within the Post Office itself only after we filed a formal theft report with USPS. 

At the time, I speculated that we might have gotten caught up in the perfect identity theft set-up.  I had no proof that any actual wrongdoing was intended or had taken place, but I noted the air-tight possibilities for someone to exploit such a situation for those purposes.

And now today I see four reported incidents of identity theft in Centerpointe within the past few months, overlapping with our own mail troubles. 

Is all this a coincidence, or does the plot thicken?  As time allows, I will endeavor to find out.