The rising theft of vehicles and auto parts has been alarming in recent years, putting any vehicle left outside overnight at risk in places like the Bronx in New York.
Only after a group of professional thieves executed over 250 thefts did the police manage to catch them, putting an end to their skillful and coordinated efforts to steal any vehicle they could get their hands on, from wheels to catalytic converters.
Imagine stepping outside your house only to find your vehicle resting on crates because thieves stole those expensive rims. The scale of losses incurred by affected motorists has been huge.
Despite the gang of thieves being arrested, the question remains whether the arrests would deter the others from continuing their illegal business.
Thieves Worked Like RaceTrack Pit Crews
According to a report by ABC 7 Eyewitness News, the Bronx District Attorney’s office accused 16 members of the Trinitarios street gang in a nearly 1,000-count indictment. Charges include grand larceny, auto stripping, and other offenses, leading to the arrest of nine members on Friday morning.
The New York Police Department and the DA stated that the thieves would lift the target cars and use the power tools to take off all four tires and wheels in no time. For vehicles they stole, the suspects reportedly used public parking garages for storage.
Three members of the gang who executed as many as six thefts in one night were spotted on video, “exiting a stolen car, fully masked, with gloves, a car jack and milk crates.”
Some of the defendants allegedly bought the stolen catalytic converters to sell them on the black market. The police officers even found a suitcase with $116,000 in cash at a defendant’s house.
“These defendants allegedly worked as fast as a racetrack pit crew in the dead of night, stealing cars, tires and rims and catalytic converters worth more than $1 million on the black market,” Bronx DA Darcel Clark said.
“All across the Bronx, people heading to work or school in the morning found their cars propped on crates, or an empty parking space, leaving them stranded and financially strained.”
Information about the suspects has been kept confidential.
Why Do Thieves Steal Catalytic Converters?
Catalytic converters are an integral component of a vehicle’s exhaust system running on an internal combustion engine or a hybrid system. They help convert most of the exhaust gases into less harmful fumes.
What makes catalytic converters valuable is the presence of metals like platinum, palladium, and rhodium. According to a report by the BBC, “some of those metals, which are used to regulate and cleanse the exhaust flow, have, at times, been worth more per gram than gold.”
“Past increases in the value of those metals have been linked to spikes in converter thefts.”
The report states that cars running on hybrid systems are more prone to theft, since “their converters are used less often, meaning the valuable metals inside tend to be in better condition.”
SUVs and vans are also more prone to catalytic converter theft due to their high ground clearance. The report added:
“Cars that sit higher above the ground, like vans and 4x4s, can also be at greater risk, as the extra room underneath makes converters easier to access and remove.”