I somehow thought this was going to be about an Aaron Rodgers contract.
Good. I have two friends, one was in a restaurant the other was at work come out to their cars to find the catalytic converters had been cut off.
Best news of the day!
If the crooks brought in $545M from the salvaged metals, imagine how much it cost all the theft victims to replace their cats.
All it takes is one crooked recycler. Amazing. Looks like an example needs to be made
IIRC the epicenter for all this evil and inconvenience was DG auto in NJ
Owner lives a coupe miles from me and a friend has sold equipment to DG Auto. Hard to believe the numbers they're talking about. $545MM!
Guy posted a pic of customer piece of jewelry that looked like a catalytic converter to Instagram. Smooth move lab partner.
Wish they would take mine.... one rattles horribly and the other one on a different vehicle is a p0430 victim....
Other than this ring, it seems cat theft is a nationwide issue, but I've never met anyone personally who's had one stolen, nor know anyone in Michigan. Just wondering.
Oh, and good on the feds for this one. I hope it costs the perps (assuming guilty) everything from their freedom, to their bank accounts and their relationships. Scum.
759NRNG said:IIRC the epicenter for all this evil and inconvenience was DG auto in NJ
That's what it says in the article.
In Houston they hit pickup trucks. Easy targets, no jacking required, and half the people in the city seem to have a pickup.
All they need is a Sawzall and they can slide under the truck and have the cat off in a minute.
Danny Shields (Forum Supporter) said:Best news of the day!
If the crooks brought in $545M from the salvaged metals, imagine how much it cost all the theft victims to replace their cats.
Oh, insurance usually covers it.
Which means everyone is paying for it.
the Honda next door got "cut" , insurance paid $3500 at the Honda dealer to get a .new one.
I would think 10-15 are cut out within a 3 mile circle from my house every week,
Yes I live in the Los anglese area but it seems to be all over the country.
This bust will not stop it .......
I don't know that I know anyone that has had one cut in the Tampa area. I'll have to ask around
South Central PA here nv200 vans are our hot ones. I write nearly $8000 ROs for replacement weekly.
At customer request we've begun using aftermarket pieces that don't work well solely because they're less of a target.
Last time everything went to E36 M3, around 08 I guess, there was a crew that hit the parking garage at the mall around Xmas. Then tried to take them to the biggest scrapper in the area, who has been in business since 1888. It didn't end well for the thieves.
They whacked my daighter's CRV in the college dorm parking lot (Arlington Tx). Campus cops said they get 3-5 per day around the campus.
I'm wondering how this will effect the scrap value of the extra cats I've got. On my last junkyard trip I got a little over $300 for a pair of secondary cats off a Boxster.
The local Tulsa new mentioned 13 people arrested in the area as part of the bust. I know that theft was common around Tulsa and I bought a Honda Element last year at a great price because the cat had just been cut off.
I'm not sure how anyone that's buying these can tell if they have been stolen or not. Not saying they didn't do bad stuff and there isn't a mountain of evidence against them, but I just recently sold 7 or 8 cats from projects I've collected over the years. I could provide a VIN to every car that I owned and prove I didn't steal them, but how does the guy buying them from me know that? He took a pic of my ID but hell I bet that could even be faked if I was clever enough.
Either way, I hope the opportunistic swine that are responsible for this type of theft get the book thrown at them. Thievery pisses me off.
In reply to captainawesome :
They are supposed to take the pink slip in the triplicate paperwork that comes with a new converter.
End of life vehicles are the loophole that cat theives exploit. Not sure how to deal with that other than requiring proof of vehicle destruction.
Shady people gonna shade. I read an article a ways back about auto theft. You are supposed to submit a title when scrapping a car. Theives would tow a car off the street and go straight to the scrap yard and supply a dog eared ancient title for something, which would get duly photocopied and put on record and the dog-eared title handed back to the thief for reuse. Vehicle is crushed and granolafied before the police even get a theft report.
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