As students return to Pullman for fall and spring semesters, Pullman Police and city departments have had to deal with a strange crime – street sign theft.

Pullman Police Cmdr. Chris Tennant said officers responded to a report of a stop sign being ripped out of the ground at the corner of Northeast Maple and Northeast Campus Streets on Sunday afternoon.

Tennant said these thefts are more common at the beginning of the semester, when students are celebrating being back in town. They tend to slow down or come to a halt as winter arrives and the ground freezes, Tennant said.

“It’s seasonal,” Tennant said. “Obviously in the winter it is not much of an issue.”

After the sign was stolen, Pullman Public Works rushed to replace it. Usually, Tennant said, Pullman Police will recover the sign, either through confiscation,  or when people return them to the station or the site of theft.

“Sometimes the signs are left,” Tennant said.

Most of the time, signs are ripped from the ground. However, Tennant said officers have seen students go the extra mile when extracting the signs.

“Sometimes,” he said, “we will see people walking down the street with the whole sign and the concrete ball sticking off the end on their shoulder.”