Abbigail Rogers is a nine-year-old who loves to race cars.
She was getting ready to go to Irwindale with her family on Friday for a race when disaster struck.
Someone had stolen the trailer holding her car and all the tools. Rogers' parents say it's at least $40,000 worth of equipment.
"She just started crying and she said why do people do this?" said Lindy Rogers, Abbigail's mother.
She says that Abbigail has had nightmares in the days since the theft and is sick to her stomach.
The Rogers family found their trailer abandoned on the side of their orchard, but all the contents inside were gone. The trailer received severe damage from being dragged across the orchard.
News of this theft comes at a time when Kern County was ranked third in the nation in car thefts per 100,000 people in 2015. Although the ranking is actually lower than 2014's second-place finish, the number of stolen cars rose substantially.
The Kern County Sheriff's Office believes AB 109 and Prop 47, bills that made crimes like theft a misdemeanor that leads to probation instead of jail, are partially to blame.
"It's only common sense to understand that if you have more people out in the community who are prone to commit crime, that more than likely crime is going to increase," said Ray Pruitt, Public Information Officer for the Kern County Sheriff's Office.
KCSO suggests drivers lock their doors, roll up their windows and park in well-lit areas to help potentially lower the chance of theft.
"A lot of these crimes are what we call 'crimes of opportunity'," said Pruitt.
"The crime occurs because the criminal is out in the community, looking to commit a crime, sees the opportunity and then acts on that opportunity. So if you don't give that criminal an opportunity, in a lot of cases, the criminal will move on to the next target."
The Rogers family says their trailer was secure but they still fell victim, leading to a mad scramble to find the race car.
"My daughter's 10th birthday is on Wednesday and her wish is that she gets her race car back."
