Kia and Hyundai owners — facing a high risk of their vehicles being stolen due to a TikTok tutorial video — snapped up all 120 steering wheel locks that were available from the Manteca Police Department on Saturday.

“It was a huge success,” said Interim Police Chief Steve Schluer.

More than 100 of them were given away in the first hour as people started waiting in the lobby a half hour before the two-hour window of distribution started.

“We plan to get some more to distribute,” Schluer said.

Kias and Hyundais have displaced Hondas Accords as the No. 1 theft vehicles in Manteca.

They accounted for the 20 percent jump in auto thefts last year within the city limits.

Auto theft went from 221 in 2021 to 265 last year.

In addition, a rash of Kia and Hyundai thefts in recent months have been reported in Manteca.

Even though vehicle thefts are on an upward trend, it is a far cry from 2005 when thieves were stealing a vehicle in Manteca every 10.9 hours for a record 798 vehicles in one year.

That nose bleed number included one big rig left idling in front of a Manteca home and a Manteca Police patrol unit.

While most older models of both name brands are targeted, police have indicated that people who leave their doors unlocked tend to be more suspectable to theft.

It is why insurance coverage has become hard to obtain to cover the fill loss of a theft in the Kias and Hyundais.

The most prolific thief of Kias and Hyundais in Cook County where Chicago is located has been an 11- year-old.

The Kia and Hyundai theft headquarters for the United States has been Minneapolis. That is where in 2022 there were 2,340 Kia and Hyundai thefts reported. That reflected an 836 percent increase over the previous year.

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com