Stretching for about 2 km, Rua Francisco Marengo, in the upscale Tatuapé neighborhood in São Paulo’s East Zone, mixes old residential townhouses—many converted into storefronts—with a dense cluster of service businesses. Last year, 50 vehicles were stolen from the street, an average of roughly one per week. It was the street with the highest number of vehicle theft-and-robbery incidents in the city of São Paulo in 2025. The data comes from a study by the Álvares Penteado School of Commerce Foundation (Fecap) in partnership with the tracking company Tracker, based on incident reports filed with the Civil Police. According to the survey, among the ten streets and avenues that top the city ranking for vehicle theft and robbery, six are in the East Zone and four in the South Zone.
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Decline
Across the city of São Paulo, these crimes fell 12% in 2025 compared to the previous year: thefts dropped from 36,535 to 32,729 and robberies from 7,792 to 6,236. The study also indicates that São Paulo state recorded an 11.4% reduction in vehicle theft and robbery over the same period. There were 88,500 police reports involving all vehicle categories, down from nearly 100,000 in 2024, according to the Fecap Tracker Bulletin. The decline was sharper in robberies, which fell 21%, while thefts decreased 9% statewide.
Santo Amaro
Santo Amaro, in the city’s South Zone, was the neighborhood with the highest number of occurrences and it also had an 8.2% increase in complaints. In total, Santo Amaro recorded 862 stolen vehicles, according to the survey—795 thefts and 67 robberies.
Cellphones
Rafael Alcadipani, a professor at FGV (Fundação Getulio Vargas) and a member of the Brazilian Forum of Public Security, says the concentration of cases in the East and South zones may be linked to weaker policing capacity in areas further from the city center, especially in peripheral districts. In these neighborhoods, he says, thieves may focus on older vehicles because they are easier to dismantle and sell for parts in illegal chop shops. As for the overall decline in vehicle thefts and robberies, Alcadipani suggests that part of the criminal activity may have shifted toward stealing cell phones—an item that is easier to take, resell, and move quickly. Even with recent declines in phone-theft statistics, he notes that São Paulo state still loses an average of 697 devices per day. He also points to the spread of integrated surveillance-camera networks, which can deter vehicle crimes and help police track stolen cars more effectively, potentially pushing offenders toward fewer traceable targets.
Analysis:
The concentration of vehicle thefts on specific streets such as Rua Francisco Marengo illustrates how urban crime often follows localized opportunity structures rather than being evenly distributed across a city. Mixed-use corridors that combine residential properties, small businesses, and high daily vehicle turnover tend to create predictable patterns of parking and circulation, which can be exploited by offenders. In areas where older vehicles remain common and where streets offer multiple exit routes, theft networks can operate with relatively low risk and quickly move stolen cars to dismantle sites.
The overall decline in vehicle theft and robbery across São Paulo suggests that a combination of preventive factors may be reshaping criminal behavior. Expanded surveillance networks, improved vehicle tracking technologies, and targeted policing operations have increased the probability that stolen cars will be recovered or traced. When the risk of detection rises, organized theft groups tend to adapt by shifting toward activities that are faster, less traceable, and require fewer logistical steps.
