2009年12月英語六級(jí)簡(jiǎn)答題全真模擬題 1
Short Answer Questions
(15 minutes)
Directions: In this part there is a short passage with five questions or incomplete statements. Read the passage carefully. Then answer the questions or complete the statements in the fewest possible words.
Joe Templer should have known better: after all, he works for a large auto-insurance company. It won't hurt to leave the key in the truck this once, he thought, as he filled his gas tank at a self-service gas station. But moments later, as he was paying the money, he saw the truck being driven away.
In 1987, 1.6 million motor vehicles were stolen in the United States — one every 20 seconds. If current trends continue, experts predict annual vehicle thefts could exceed two million by the end of the decade.
Vehicle theft is a common phenomenon, which has a direct impact on over four million victims a year. The cost is astonishing.
Many police officials blame professional thieves for the high volume of thefts. It is a major money-maker for organized crime. Typically, stolen cars are taken to pieces and the parts sold to individuals. But as many as 200,00 cars are smuggled out of the country every year. Most go to Latin America, the Middle East and Europe.
Only about 15 percent car thefts result in arrest, because few police departments routinely conduct in-depth auto-investigations. When thieves are arrested, judges will often sentence them to probation (緩刑), not immediately put them in prison because the prisons are overcrowded with violent criminals.
One exception is a Michigan program that assigns 92 police officers to work full-time on the state's 65,000 car theft cases a year. Since 1986, when the effort began, the state's auto-theft rate has fallen from second in the nation to ninth.