A Jugging We Will Go -- Part I

A Jugging We Will Go

If you have not heard the term “jugging,” you might not be paying close attention to the news. Juggers are criminals that wait in or near parking lots near banks, credit unions, or ATMs and watch for people who have likely withdrawn large amounts of money. Juggers then follow the prospective victim to another location where they either physically assault the victim and take their money or wait until the victim is distracted or moves away from their vehicle and they then break into the vehicle to steal the money.

One of my students was a jugging victim in San Antonio in early 2024. She had entered and conducted business at a credit union and then returned home. When she arrived at her house, she pulled her pickup into the driveway through an open gate. She then exited her vehicle and went to the mailbox (outside the yard’s fenced area) to retrieve her mail.

Video of the front gate area shows a car which was following directly behind her pickup drive past her house and then quickly turn around and pull up to her driveway entrance as she is returning from the mailbox. A thug exits the vehicle’s passenger door and sprints to the pickup’s open driver’s door and dives into the pickup to grab her purse. 

She confronts the thug at the driver’s door; however, he pushes past her and returns to his vehicle, jumps in, and the thugs depart.

As the thug returned to his vehicle, my student (who was armed) considered drawing her pistol; however, she thought better of it and did not draw since she was not facing an imminent deadly threat. She said her training kicked in and she realized that drawing her pistol was not warranted. The thug did not threaten her physically nor did he exhibit a weapon; he only pushed past her as he escaped. A good decision on her part given the totality of the circumstances.

San Antonio Police Officers who were investigating the incident told my student that credit union cameras recorded images of the juggers waiting in the parking lot (presumably looking for a potential victim) and slipping in behind her pickup as she departed. The juggers followed her home which was over ten miles from the credit union--she did not notice the car which was directly behind her.

Jugging is on the rise across the United States. In Austin, Texas for example, in 2022 there were 153 reported jugging incidents where victims lost over $1.3 million dollars or an average of approximately $8500.00 per incident. That same year, the Houston Police Department reported over 700 jugging incidents. I have been unable to find any definitive statistics for 2023 or 2024; however, there is no reason to believe the trend is declining.

As I researched this article, I realized that some of these jugging teams are surprisingly sophisticated. When Dallas, Tx saw a rise jugging incidents in 2016 and 2017, the FBI began investigating. Ultimately the bureau arrested and charged thirteen members of a Houston-based crew with over 30 jugging offenses in the Dallas area--there were likely many more. The FBI concluded that the crew had taken more than $750,000.00 dollars, primarily from small business owners and operators.

In researching numerous incidents, I noted that often there were perpetrators using multiple vehicles in coordinated surveillance efforts to identify and follow victims. This fact hit home when I encountered the report of an incident in Schertz, TX, just north of San Antonio. The victim conducted business at a credit union (which coincidentally is the same one my wife and I use). When he departed the location, juggers followed him to a business in a near-by city and severely beat and robbed the victim who died several days later. The juggers lived in Houston and traveled to the San Antonio area to perpetrate their criminal enterprise.

Credit union surveillance video shows a woman wearing a mask inside the credit union and watching the victim. She exits the credit union and enters a gray Chevrolet Impala before following the victim to another business; surveillance video in that location shows the Impala circling the business parking lot while the victim was inside. As the victim exited the business, a Chevrolet Trailblazer pulled up behind the victim’s car and a passenger wearing a surgical mask exited the Trailblazer, approached the victim from behind and then attacked him and knocked him down. A struggle ensued before the suspect took off with an envelope containing the victim’s money. Cibolo, TX police photos show that at least three perpetrators in multiple cars were involved in this fatal robbery. See picture below.

I came across one incident where a bank employee was working with a jugging crew. The bank teller likely noted a pattern where a woman who owned a gas station and check-cashing business routinely withdrew large amounts of cash.  The day of the incident, police say that the bank teller notified the jugging crew that a woman had made a large withdrawal. The juggers followed the woman to her business where she was attacked and robbed of $75,000.00. The woman and her husband who tried to help her were both severely injured and hospitalized.

A former bank teller and the jugging team she tipped off

 

How can we prevent ourselves from becoming a jugging victim? My original intent when I started researching jugging robberies was to write a relatively short article. However, as I researched these incidents and the jugger’s tactics, I realized that since sophisticated teams were perpetrating many of these crimes, the article would need to deal with counter surveillance and other tactics as well. In Part II will discuss how you can avoid becoming a jugging victim.

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