A quiet Bronx neighborhood is anything but quiet after thieves targeted multiple parked Hondas overnight, stripping out airbags and leaving behind shattered glass and furious residents.
Waking up to a neighbor’s frantic phone call before 6 a.m. is nobody’s idea of a good Tuesday. But that is exactly what happened to a Pelham Bay woman named Dee, who received just that kind of early-morning wake-up and rushed outside to find her Honda with the window smashed and the airbag ripped clean out. The damage stretched across multiple streets in the neighborhood, including Pilgrim and St. Teresa avenues and Edison Avenue, where several Hondas were hit in what appears to have been a coordinated overnight sweep.
For Dee, the fallout has been immediate and deeply personal. She has a pregnant daughter who relies on her for transportation, she had to call out of work, and she is now trying to figure out how to rent a car while bracing for what could be thousands of dollars in repair costs. “I can’t even think straight,” she told News 12 reporters at the scene. That kind of financial gut-punch is not a small thing for a working family. An airbag alone can cost well over $1,000 to replace through a legitimate repair shop, and that does not account for window replacement, lost wages, or the cost of a rental vehicle.
What makes this incident especially frustrating for longtime residents is that it is not even remotely surprising. Neighbors say car crime has plagued this stretch of the Bronx for years, with multiple people reporting that their vehicles have been targeted more than once. One resident mentioned thieves had previously taken cars out for joy rides. Another said incidents happen “often enough.” The community’s patience is clearly running out.
Why Airbags Have Become a Prime Target
It may seem strange to think of an airbag as a hot commodity, but the math makes sense to thieves. Airbags are worth upwards of $2,000 retail and can reportedly be removed in as little as two minutes, making them an extremely efficient score for organized theft crews. Once a steering wheel or dashboard is torn apart, owners can face repair bills that climb well past $1,000, on top of the inconvenience of being left without a safe, fully functioning vehicle.
Hondas in particular have been singled out repeatedly across New York City in these types of crimes. Police have confirmed that Hondas are preferred targets in airbag thefts, and experts say the professionals behind these jobs scan neighborhoods in advance, knowing exactly which cars they are going after. That level of organization is part of what makes it so hard to stop.
This Is Part of a Much Bigger Pattern in the Bronx
Pelham Bay is not alone, and this incident is not isolated. As of mid-May 2025, year-to-date Bronx auto theft statistics were up 8.1%, and for the 28-day period ending May 11, they were up 19.1%. Residents across the borough have been sounding alarms about this for a while. In the Allerton neighborhood, thieves hit an entire strip of Acura vehicles in a single night and took all the airbags, with one victim waiting nine hours for police to arrive.
This same Pelham Bay community had already been through a remarkably similar ordeal. In September 2024, News 12 crews captured eight Honda vehicles on Merry Avenue with broken locks and missing airbags. Residents said that over the prior three months, they had experienced catalytic converter, rim, tire, and airbag thefts. Then in November 2024, eight more Hondas were broken into on 195th Street, with locks and airbags ripped out, leaving one resident worried about rising insurance costs. The community has essentially been living through a rolling crime wave involving the same type of vehicles and the same type of theft, in the same neighborhood, for well over a year.
What Residents and Experts Say Can Help
People in the community are not sitting quietly. Neighbors interviewed by News 12 are calling for a more consistent police presence, noting that officers will show up once or twice after an incident and then disappear again for a week. One resident said she would like to see patrol at least every day, which is a completely reasonable ask for a neighborhood that has been repeatedly victimized.
On the practical side, security experts have weighed in on what individual car owners can do. A Pelham Bay resident who installed a camera on his vehicle after a prior theft said the added visibility makes his car less of a target. One mechanic noted that while an aftermarket alarm cannot necessarily stop a break-in, it can prevent someone from driving away with the entire vehicle. Steering wheel clubs, dashcams, and parking in well-lit areas are all tools that security professionals recommend.
Residents have also called for cameras and better street lighting to help catch perpetrators, a sentiment echoed by theft victims across the Bronx in similar incidents.
What This Incident Can Teach Us
There are a few things worth taking from this story beyond the immediate outrage. First, organized auto parts theft is not random. Authorities note that public awareness and prompt communication with police remain key tools in disrupting theft crews and identifying those involved. That means calling in suspicious activity quickly and not assuming someone else already did it.
Second, airbag theft carries real safety consequences. A car with a missing airbag is a dangerous car. Drivers may not even realize what is gone until they are already on the road, meaning the risk is not just financial. Third, the financial burden on working-class families in neighborhoods like Pelham Bay is disproportionate. These are not people who can easily absorb a $2,000 repair bill or a week without a vehicle. The cost of inaction by authorities falls heaviest on those who can least afford it.
Finally, a pattern this consistent, in this specific area, targeting this specific type of vehicle, over this long a period, is a signal that something more coordinated needs to happen on the law enforcement side. News 12 reached out to the NYPD for comment but had not received a response as of Tuesday afternoon.