Authorities nationwide are urging holiday shoppers to keep their heads on a swivel as crooks lean into a fast-growing crime fad that’s making it easier than ever to rip off unsuspecting victims.

The trend, known as “jugging,” has turned into a go-to move for thieves who stalk people leaving ATMs, banks, or stores, according to the FBI. The holidays make it even worse, with shoppers lugging around envelopes of cash or pricey gifts that make them easy marks.

“Jugging is just, in my opinion, a slang term for crimes of opportunity,” retired NYPD officer Bill Stanton told Fox News Digital. “Think of predators, where there are crocodiles or water creatures that hang out by the watering hole, right? And in this case, it’s an ATM or an ATM-type machine.”

Cases have piled up across the country, and Texas has been hit especially hard. On Nov. 10, a 70-year-old man visiting an ATM in a Houston Walmart parking lot was robbed at gunpoint, police told FOX26. Investigators said the gunman forced the victim to withdraw cash, then shot him after taking the cash. The man was rushed to a nearby hospital and remains in critical condition.

Another Houston man was targeted on April 29 after withdrawing money from a Wells Fargo ATM, police said. Officers believe the suspect followed the victim to a car wash, flashed a gun and tried to rob him before fleeing on foot and jumping into a white SUV.

Just a day before that attack, two suspects trailed a man from a Chase Bank, then boxed in his vehicle while he ran into a gas station, according to police. Surveillance video captured the pair smashing both front windows before snatching a cash envelope from the center console. Detectives say the two are likely the same suspects involved in the next day’s attempted robbery.

Federal prosecutors have cracked down as well. Earlier this year, a Houston man was sentenced to 120 months in prison after admitting to a jugging robbery that targeted an ATM technician, according to the Department of Justice.

Department of Justice

Prosecutors said 33-year-old Johnny Juwan Clark was already on supervised release for a previous robbery when he and three accomplices forced an ATM worker to the ground and stole hundreds of thousands of dollars in Midlothian, Texas. Clark was part of a Houston-based criminal ring called the “Hiram Clarke Money Team,” and admitted following the technician through multiple stops before ambushing him in front of a Chase Bank ATM, according to the DOJ.

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