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Soaring fuel prices have one consequence: that of exploding fuel thefts. Sometimes this happens in surprising proportions. Investigation.
The looters used to target truckers. In recent months, farmers’ reserves have also been affected. Fuel thefts explode: + 149% over one year according to the Paris police headquarters. In Seine-et-Marne, cameras are no longer enough. Pascal Housset, a heating engineer made the radical decision to ask its employees to return home with the construction vehicles. Around other craftsmen have been siphoned off. “With fuel prices soaring, it has become a scarce, expensive commodity and so unfortunately there are skyrocketing harms“, comments Pascal Housset, manager.
Fuel thefts are also driven by recent shortages. Faced with this, carriers feel helpless. In Seine-Maritime, school buses were siphoned off several hundred liters in mid-September. The gendarmes often deal with gangs organized but sometimes they also challenge individuals. In Belfort (Territory-of-Belfort), a couple is thus accused of having siphoned off more than 5,000 liters of fuel.