Top 10 most-stolen Corvettes, Top 10 states for thefts

More than one in ten Corvettes have been stolen over the past three decades years, says report today from the insurance industry's National Insurance Crime Bureau, which tallies the Top 10 most-stolen models and the Top 10 states for stolen 'Vettes stolen.

Photo galleries:

Readers' Corvettes, 1960s and earlier

Readers' Corvettes through the years, 1970s

Readers' Corvettes through the years, 1980s

Readers' Corvettes through the years, 1990s

Readers' new millennium Corvettes

Reader Corvettes on Vacation

Astronauts' Corvettes

The report from the NICB, which posted the video above, does offer some slim hope for distraught owners, noting that a 1965 Sting Ray stolen in Nashville in 1970 was recovered near Phoenix -- but not until 39 years later.

The report tallied thefts from the 300 original C1-generation cars in 1953 to the C6 generation in 2011. The NICB says the 1953-2011 data showed 134,731 reports of stolen Corvettes in the period, during which 1,526,747 were built.

The NICB says, however, that data quality is spotty until the feds standardized VIN numbers for the 1981 model year, so for its Top 10 report today it used only 1981-2011 data. During that three decades, 862,918 'Vettes were built and 90,427 were reported stolen in the U.S. and Puerto Rico.

The top 10 model years stolen accounted for 55,132 -- 61% -- of the thefts from 1981-2011. And the Top 10 states accounted for 63,409 -- a whopping 70% -- of the stolen 'Vettes.

The year most popular with thieves has been the 1984 -- the first of the C4 generation -- and 1984 was also the highest production year for 'Vettes, with 51,547.

Here are the Top 10 most stolen Corvette model years 1981-2011 and the Top 10 for most 'Vettes stolen:

Model year, total thefts:

1. 1984, 8,554
2. 1981, 8,262
3. 1979, 6,399
4. 1985, 6,348
5. 1980, 6,331
6. 1982, 4,565
7. 1978, 4,129
8. 1977, 3,983
9. 1986, 3,525
10. 1976, 3,036

Top 10 states for 'Vette theft, number stolen 1981-2011:

1. California,14,002
2. Florida, 8,731
3. Texas, 8,198
4. New York, 7,926
5. Michigan, 5,467
6. New Jersey, 5,287
7. Illinois, 4,092
8. Massachusetts, 3,821
9. Ohio, 3,078
10. Missouri, 2,807

More details about the report and more tables are at the NICB web site here. The insurance industry-supported NICB, based in Des Plaines, Ill., was founded in 1912 and is dedicated to fighting insurance fraud and vehicle theft. The bureau says it got its Corvette production figures for the report from the Corvette Black Book (online at www.corvetteblackbook.com).