A city councilor announces a new crusade to combat criminals who puncture tires to boost repair shops. But it’s an old problem.
As if Bogotá drivers didn’t have enough on their plate – congestion, potholes, car restrictions, flooded underpasses – professional gangs are purposefully puncturing tires.
It’s nothing new: for years citizen sleuths have posted online evidence of so-called pinchallanta tire poppers spiking cars in the same traffic hotspots across the city, and angry motorists have demanded action against nearby tire repair shops clearly in cahoots.
And, yes, there is news coverage and promises from the authorities but with depressing regularity the problem bounces back.
Now, though, city councilor Sandra Forero has announced a public campaign with a hotline to denounce attacks and an online form where motorists can post details of incidents.
“We are going to collect the complaints to prove that pinchallantas is a systematic practice, not isolated incidents. This is my crusade to end this harmful practice that affects citizens so much,” announced Forero on X.
More than 100 complaints were received in the first week of March.
That deflated feeling…
The recent campaign was sparked by a video circulating online in February which showed a motorbike weaving in front of a large SUV. In the footage a rider casually lowers his foot to deposit a spike in front of the car wheel.
Other testimony depicted accomplices rushing on foot to “assist” a stricken vehicle and guide it to a nearby tire shop.
According to those targeted, gangs were using sharpened steel tubes called pitos designed to instantly flatten modern self-sealing tires, and struck during rush hour or on busy holiday weekends when travelers are queuing to escape the city.
With their tires instantly deflated, and stuck in traffic, most motorists opted to limp to the nearest workshop conveniently nearby.
There, according to some victims, the tire was further damaged during the “repair” to justify a higher price, with some workshops charging US$50 to sort a single tire.
A circular business
“Some retailers are reporting up to four flat tires a month,” Councilor Forero claimed to Caracol Radio last week, based on data she said came in from the hotline. In Bogotá the scam had become “a circular business” and “much bigger than we thought,” she said.
Few Bogotá drivers would doubt that.
A similar crime wave was reported back in 2019, again in 2022 and then in 2023 when RCN Noticias highlighted the case of a driver who suffered 12 tire attacks in one month on the same stretch of road now in the spotlight, the Calle 80.
Then, as now, city authorities and police commanders promised to “find those who commit these types of acts that affect citizens.”
So what’s changed?
Now drivers can denounce online allowing data and mapping to be passed to police, explained Councilor Forero on her X account.
Information collated so far shows hotspots around Calle 80, which is the main road heading west out of the city, Calle 161 with Carrera 9, Avenida Boyacá with Calle 53, the Autopista Norte leaving the city and the Autopista Sur, the main road leaving south, around Soacha.
But even with a better picture of the scope of the problem, drivers interviewed by Noticias RCN were doubtful of an impact without tougher legal measures against perpetrators and the tire shops behind them. “This scam needs to be treated as a crime,” said one.
Seal of disapproval
In response to the campaign, Bogotá police stepped up investigations of suspect tire shops in early March, focusing on the Engativá district of the capital, which is bisected by the problematic Calle 80.
Some 60 premises were inspected, of which 17 were ‘sellado’, or ‘sealed’, meaning their entrances taped off and the tire shops closed, said local police chief Lieutenant Colonel Paula Guiza through the police X account.
She also confirmed that the deliberate act of damaging a tire was considered a crime under the Colombian penal code.
However, it seems the 17 tire shops sanctioned were “not complying with documentation” and only suspended temporarily. In fact, out of the 17 sealed, only one workshop was “definitively closed,” according to the police, and not directly related to pinchallantas.
Many motorists have since commented online that suspected tire shops were already back in action, or that the pinchallantas merely moved down the road.
“It’s useless if control throughout the city does not continue; these criminals close the site today and a few days later are open,” said one X poster.
Another commented that: “Citizens are increasingly concerned about the perception of impunity and the lack of effective measures to combat this crime,” after posting a video of another attack online.
Can public pressure tilt the scales? That’s the hope of Councilor Forero, who wants victims to denounce and unite with her campaign to “put the corrupt tire shops out of business.”
The city might just nail its pinchallantas.