Justice Department announces takedown of catalytic converter theft ring
justice.gov
justice.gov
It's good to see something is done. Let's hope this steamrolls into a nationwide manhunt for these criminals. They should also consider targeting and auditing shops that buy used car parts. Making it extremely difficult to fence these things will be practical and useful because they aren't sold and reused as is - the rare earth metals are extracted. Something your average criminal won't be capable of doing in their garage.
Gotta get all the cat converters you can before all the cars are electric!
It may happen, but it will never be anywhere near as common as cat theft.
One is safe, trivial, fast, and pays a lot. The other is extremely difficult, possibly lethal, and can’t easily be melted down for profit like a cat.
I'd go so far as to say that an EV is a glorified "battery with wheels" since the actual drive components are a minority of the weight/complexity/cost. If a criminal can steal the whole EV, they will, if they cannot then stealing the battery alone isn't realistic.
I worry that a parallel development might happen in smartphones.
Now what? How do you get it into another vehicle to transport? There's no place for a small crane to attach to. You would need some sort of hydraulic lift that would be similar to a pallet jack. Once it's up you then need to move it onto the truck which would be difficult. Maybe you can drag it on the back of a truck using a pickup bed mounted winch.
Finally what do you do with it? It's nearly impossible to remove the individual cells, they are incased in some sort of protective foam that you have to chisel out. Sell the entire thing? Tesla will know the battery is stolen, car reads the serial number, bam, back to you.
Not to mention how large it is, how many could you do in one night?
More importantly why did you make your post? Do you have EVs so much that anytime even a slight advantage comes along you have to dispute it? Maybe you just like to argue. It's just really weird.
Drill in, destroy the the charging port on the car, retrieve the cable and sell on Ebay. How much do one of those charging cables go? $200? If not, and if the owner does something to lock the cable, cutting it for the copper is still worth a few dollars.
https://electrek.co/2022/02/07/tesla-supercharger-cables-sto...
> If not, and if the owner does something to lock the cable, cutting it for the copper is still worth a few dollars.
Worth the risk of electrocution with a possibly live 50-350kW flowing through a CCS charger cable? Seems like a different level of risk than a catalytic converter.
And aim here is to retrieve the charging cable intact. If you do it right the drill bit shouldn't be getting anywhere close to the energized lines. Just an example, check this data sheet for an EV inlet port: https://www.phoenixcontact.com/us/products/1162148/pdf
The locking mechanism is located to the side. You don't need to remove the locking pin as it's recessed in the charging handle itself, you just need to destroy the mechanism behind the pin so that there's enough void there for you to jostle the pin out and free the connector.
In theory it should actually be quite safe for a thief.
They really don't care.
I don't think it's something you can lay at the feet of the SF Police Department. I asked Pete McLaughlin, SFPD (retired), why the police don't go after bike thieves more aggressively.
"Our hands are tied," he said. "They [the thieves] know the most we can do is give them a citation, and they'll be out that afternoon."
California has a history of being lenient with non-violent crime, which is appropriate in some cases, but maybe not in others. Maybe leniency is the wrong approach for some of these bike thieves.
But it's complicated. I heard Jerry Brown (former California Governor) talk about how ~10% of the state budget goes to prisons, and he's not comfortable with such a large amount, and I agree--throwing people in jail is expensive!
American police are similar to a permanent paramilitary class like Janissaries or samurai. The local governments don't actually control them and as a civilian encountering them means they may kill you for honor violations.
Go ahead and try to find the guidelines, charter, mission, etc. for any municipality policing force. If there is one. Now try and define the actual jurisdiction they have, and the _requirements_ for fulfilling their charge.
How many US citizens younger than 70, without FU $$, do not immediately act like they need to be on their "best behavior" when a Uniformed Officer drives (or less likely, walks/bikes) through? Now add any attribute that makes you stick out from the rest of the community. Does it still feel like they are there to protect you?
Skin color? Religious attire that isn't a suit w/tie or a dress? Hair color? Music? Having way too much fun in a public place while being younger than 30?
Here's a good place to start: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/545/748/#tab-opi...
Property crimes don't matter anymore. When my friends got their catalytic converters stolen the police never even bothered to show up. Taking statements may not get their cats back, but it goes towards building up a large enough case to justify a unit to handle it.
You are correct though. Our DA is a "soft on crime" type. As a result, all forms of criminal behavior have increased dramatically in the last several years.
People generally have no idea how much crime there is. If you asked most people which of NYC and Oklahoma is safer they'd get it wrong whether or not they lived there.
There is a wide gap between liberal “people shouldn’t go to jail because they were on drugs while poor” and “no one should be prosecuted for anything”
https://missionlocal.org/2022/04/chesa-boudin-files-more-cha...
But he was insensitive in public when there was a wave of anti-Asian crimes, and turnout was low in his initial election. Not sure about the recall.
She got into office, paid a lot of money to legal consultants, and a few months later, announced that she will be... Dropping the backlog of misdemeanors.
She attacked that exact same line of reasoning when running for election.
Unsurprisingly, once actually elected, as everyone had said all along, it turned out to be the only way to go forward.
And, of course, the promised reductions in crime are, well, not exactly in any hurry to materialize.
On the one hand, it's a plus that she prioritized good sense over dogma, but on the other hand, it's a little strange how her policies are only bad when its the other party that's advocating for them.
Edit because I happen to have the interview bookmarked: Nicole Thomas-Kennedy was the opponent, and in her own words[1], "the goal is to end misdemeanor prosecution."
[1] https://publicola.com/2021/10/18/publicola-questions-nicole-...
NTK was a nutter who wanted to stop all prosecution in the city. Ann Davison was a tough on crime realist. Huge difference.
You might be referring to the incumbent who didn't make it through the open primary, but he got us into this mess in the first place. No one was going to give him another shot.
If you’re referring to that SF DA that was refusing to prosecute people that was a case where their public platform was to stop over criminalizing but it turned out that their parents were terrorists and they just wanted them out of jail.
1. It’s serialized and you want it on the recovery lists
2. You need the report for an insurance claim
3. You want to be counted in statistics used to determine policing levels
4. The item could be used in a crime and you want to be cleared (think stolen car, stolen gun)
There's also insurance claim data which requires a police report.
> When the cops don’t show up to take a report it doesn’t show up in crime report statistics.
This is accurate. You appear to be arguing that the reporting is commensurate with actual crime. You haven't provided any evidence of that.
In San Francisco I didn't need the cops to show up to file a report--I filled it out online! It's easier than ever to file a report these days.
California just passed a law to this end, which is pretty straightforward and effectively turns the grey market into a black market. A black market will still exist, but it will be a lot harder for legitimate junkyards, auto repair shops, and recycling facilities to look the other way.
It basically mandates KYC (Know Your Customer) procedures for companies that buy or sell catalytic converters, and it makes buying or selling a catalytic converter without documentation that it was obtained legally a crime. It won't completely eliminate the problem, and it'll be harder unless Arizona, Nevada, and Mexico also take similar steps. But it should also enable more targeting and auditing. One part of this case was filed in California, so I bet they had some kind of sting operation that was made a lot easier when they can lean on a low-level junkyard dealer to testify against the people higher up in the black market.
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-09-25/newsom-s...
This is worse than the original problem. When did we become so comfortable with the government mandating presentation of papers and tracking of private transactions?
Effective, privacy-preserving law enforcement is difficult.
That doesn’t mean we should cut corners through ever-increasing state oversight targeted at the latest symptoms of criminality.
The choice isn’t between laws like this and having your catalytic converter stolen. The choice is between law enforcement actually doing their job, or invasive and ineffectual laws like this.
The justice department, in the very article we’re discussing, investigated and took down this ring without California’s new “KYC” regulations.
The police can — clearly, as per this article — do their job without yet another intrusive privacy overreach being put permanently on the books.
I'm hoping a law helps, but I won't hold my breath.
I'm a big proponent making police do actual police work to catch offenders.
In fact, police use of geo-fencing warrants, genealogical database mining, IMSI catchers and other invasions of privacy are all huge overreaches that should be slapped down hard.
That said, what reasonable mechanism do you suggest for police to use in identifying and deterring the catalytic converter (CC) theft market? Having "legitimate" businesses report on their interactions with CCs seems minimally invasive, as compared with other extremely invasive practices already being used by law "enforcement".
Given that (IIUC) most stolen CCs are broken down for the expensive metals they contain, rather than being sold in a black aftermarket, it's unlikely that police can just find a stolen CC and look at its serial number to determine whether or not it's been stolen.
Are you arguing that we should ignore the issue of stolen CCs because any action is worse, or do you have a reasonable suggestion as to how to address this issue? That's not a jab at you. You seem to have strong feelings about this (I don't), so I'd like to understand what potential alternatives might exist to the new law. If you'd expand on that, I'd be most appreciative!
While I don't disagree with the idea that police should do, you know, actual police work, rather than trample on the privacy of the population (e.g., all these calls for encryption back doors as well as the stuff I mention above), it's not clear to me what the issue might be here.
Plenty of hackers, for instance, supported the creation of the EPA. I know plenty of permaculture hackers and mycologist hackers who very much want the government regulating pollutants and safety.
After Timothy McVeigh blew up a building with a truck full of agricultural supplies.
The decrease in domestic terrorism is due to societal changes and better old-fashioned policing of home-grown extremist groups. We didn’t somehow make it impossible (or even difficult) to improvise large explosives.
The actual bomb planning for the Oklahoma City bombing was less than a year and involved two people. So, seems like the bar was raised quite a bit.
It's not so much a big victory for the terrorists as a big black eye for America and our intelligence agencies.
One of the 9/11 pilots was reported to Federal agencies multiple times[1] and the hijacking still took place.
[0]https://theintercept.com/2021/09/11/september-11-saudi-arabi...
I mean sure, you could also ask how laws against shoplifting fail to stop bank robberies, and it would be just as coherent.
Japan would like to have a word with you.
Have you ever run a business? You have to track a lot already. For the IRS, for your business license, for auditing, for compliance depending on what goods and services you sell. You know like firearms, tobacco, alcohol, pharmaceuticals are big ones, but also animals, chemicals, certain kinds of technology. If you require a federal permit, if you sell goods across state, international, if you ship things. Like, I feel like this cat came out of the bag before the 18th century, based on my understanding of the regulation of businesses in the United States.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2021/11/the-new...
It didn’t.
Meanwhile, the overwhelming majority of people buying allergy medicine have the sniffles, not a meth lab.
There’s always a “safety” justification for further privacy intrusions by the police.
If they can’t do their job without intrusive, non-targeted government monitoring of the general public, the police need to get better at their jobs.
That's not true. First they don't just sell it to you, they take your ID, record your information, send that to the state, and then sell it you. Going to one store after another after another collecting lots of pills isn't the only thing that will trip people up either. I've had times when I was told I couldn't purchase allergy medication because I'd purchased some already. I had recently, for the family, but I was traveling and didn't have the medication with me.
I wasn't going around to a bunch of stores buying mass quantities of allergy medications, I'd made a purchase once and several days/weeks after tried to make a second purchase. I can't imagine I'm the only person alive who has failed to bring a medication with them while traveling, or suddenly had need for it when they didn't have some immediately on their person, or made a purchase and soon after lost it, only to discover that a pointless restriction brought about by a failed war on drugs prevented a simple purchase fully intended for treatment of a medical condition.
Maybe a more sane threshold for treating people like criminals would help the situation, but honestly the entire program seems like a waste of time of money at this point.
Really, if we're this wound up about the situation, the answer is simple: just make Sudafed require a prescription, like a zillion other medications. The problem with Sudafed is extremely straightforward: it is a very trivial chemical reaction away from being methamphetamine.
Some states have made the requirement for prescriptions, but it hasn't done them much good https://www.huffpost.com/entry/meth-laws-oregons-prescriptio...
I'm no fan of meth labs, but this just seems like a bad solution being made worse by poor implementation.
Requiring a prescription for common cold medicine raises the price of cold relief from $12 to $100+.
Like... meth exists.
I see that the “[feeling of] safety above all” contingent is quite voracious about defending this latest government intrusion, so I’ll stop giving them comments to downvote.
It can be as simple as this:
1. Joe brings in a cat
2. Store takes the cat, but writes down Joes important information (DL #, name, address, etc)
3. If Joe brings a new cat in within some reasonable time period factoring in possibly fixing a used car or something he's reported to the authorities for suspicion of theft.
Exceptions to (3) can be made to people who can present the valid credentials of an auto repair shop and are operating as agents of that shop. Then the shop can be placed in the record book and tracked with different standards.
With this in place you will only be able to fence X number of cats easily where X is the number of shops within some reasonable distance. You could even make this national if you really wanted to prevent transportation over a border.
Sure, you could argue this won't fix anything because shops that are dirty will remain dirty. This is simply solved by having an already existing traffic enforcement body once a year check books. If your books are out of order your business is closed and an investigation is done to see if you're acting as a fence. Same as pawn shops.
There is absolutely no "intrusion" to speak of here. You are in possession of a highly valuable, commonly stolen item. KYC by a company should be a minimum standard. Do you think that requiring a car title and asking for registration, etc when you sell a car to a lot is also an intrusion? I'm afraid to ask you if you even know what fencing actually is. No one is saying you can't cut your own cat off and sell it privately. The goal is to eliminate the easiest possible routes for fencing and make it not only difficult but also expensive criminally to continue.
Well, there is, actually. I think it's a bit histrionic to worry about it, but we definitely have intruded on Joe's freedom to buy and sell cats. Maybe he's into cat arbitrage. Maybe he makes them himself. Maybe he's got a lot of cars he doesn't need to drive and is strapped for cash. The point of the sticklers for freedom here is that regular citizens shouldn't need an explanation for why they're buying or selling a particular thing to another private party, and therefore tracking the fact that they did is an intrusion.
It's not technically wrong. It's an intrusion. It just happens to be an intrusion I think is reasonable.
No we haven't. Joe is free to resell converters, provided he proves he obtained them legally, which is trivial _if_ you obtained them legally.
... an increased burden over private sales of other goods (and over existing standards for sales of catalytic converters), which quite literally constitutes an "intrusion."
I have no interest in stopping Joe from selling to Bob, or going on craigslist and selling his wares if he, for some reason, has figured out a way to manufacturer with rare earth metals in his garage. Though I think this is a bit of a stretch of the normal argument. First, because catalytic converters are exceedingly hard to create. Second, because the profit is not in arbitrage but rather theft. Making a catalytic converter is very expensive. There are only a dozen or so companies with the infrastructure to make them at a scale that is profitable. Hence, if we could magically wish away cat theft it would not be remotely profitable to do some kind of rare earth arbitrage by the books. So, ipso facto, it is a good place to enforce at the very least a minimum amount of KYC with associated punishments when third party sales to businesses who do this sort of thing is involved.
I understand the arguments from the other side are the same arguments made for the KYC surrounding the $10,000 withdrawal limit to "stop drug money". I disagree with that kind of KYC. When in 99% cases they are ill gotten gains there must be something done because the alternative is foisting the cost ($300-$XXXX dollars) onto the innocent and throwing your hands up. Worse yet, it's not a one time cost and these criminals, undeterred, will simply return to steal the new one as well. This is no way to treat law abiding citizens.
(Some?) modern catalytic converters have much less rare earth minerals, making them less (not?) profitable to steal.
> this sentence is actually humorous if you dont know what cat is short for...
Your parent comment had me thinking you were making a weird cat analogy until the cutting part.
>> The choice is between law enforcement actually doing their job, or invasive and ineffectual laws like this.
I'm on guard for overreah all the time, but I'm OK with showing ID to buy alcohol, drive a car, fly on a plane, sell items that should rarely be done in bulk outside of rare conditions, like a bunch of catalytic converters.
you should probably re-evaluate your ideas about personal ID with regards to travel if you're interested in over-reach. These laws are routinely used as an anti-immigration method by ICE and equivalents, and there is very little proof that they do much to make the world any safer.
So now, the government keeps track of what and how much booze I buy. Ugh.
This is beyond stupid, as people stopped thinking I might be under 21 back when the buffalo roamed.
The few other states I could easily find online that had a similar law typically require that retailers either don’t store the data or that they delete it within X days.
But I already said government too much. This is all non-senses. Transactions should not be monitored.
Locally, a large (100+) chain (Plaid Pantry) of convenience stores also is scanning licenses. Saw somebody with an Olde English 40 and a passport.
It's not the law in Oregon (or Washington) but the article says it is in Tennessee. Also says you can ask them to type in the digits of your birthdate.
I took a flight today. I had to show my ID once at the start of the security line where they did NOT check my boarding pass.
Then at the gate they only wanted to see my boarding pass and not my ID.
So basically nobody actually cares about ID when flying. It would have been trivial to buy the ticket in a false name or "borrow" someone else's name without asking.
To be clear, this failing is all on the gate procedure. If security wanted to check boarding pass or if they have to hooked up on the computer there, a simple bypass would be to buy a cheap ticket in your real name and the ticket you intend to fly in some other name.
To get through TSA as a member of the general public, you have to have a ticket (or a non-traveler gate pass) in your real name (matching your ID, soon to be real ID requirement) for a flight leaving in the next N hours. International flights check your passport at the boarding gate. For domestic, sure, you could swap to another boarding pass purchased under a different name, but what's the threat model there? You've already been screened.
Say you've done a crime that will be discovered in a few days. You buy a ticket to Detroit and next week the fbi will be wasting its time looking for you in Michigan and trying to convince Canada to search for you in Ontario.
In reality you hopped on a flight to El Paso under a fake name and you are deep into Mexico by now.
Though totally agree you could fly on a different flight under a fake name assuming that the airlines don’t sync up their records with the IDs the TSA scans at the checkpoints.
I suspect there’s other less visible signals that would make this harder. For example your flight under a fake name might be flagged for being an unknown name/person. Also if you’re on the run it’s hard to buy a flight under a fake name anonymously without a paper trail back to yourself.
In Britain, criminals were stealing the thick, copper cables used for power and signaling of the railway. They wrapped a chain around cables near a road crossing, attached it to a truck, and dragged a significant length of cable away, to sell as scrap.
That naturally means the railway can't be used for many hours, occasionally over a day, and costs a tremendous about to repair. (It is one of the most safety-critical large systems around.) There's huge disruption, as 600 people per train every 20 minutes simply don't fit on any other means of transport.
Compared to catalytic converters, the disruption to society is far greater, the replacement cost much higher, and the scrap value relatively lower.
About 10 years ago, a law was introduced forbidding scrap metal dealers from paying cash, and requiring them to check ID. That led to a 30% drop in theft.
Is that a reasonable law?
My ass it did. I've worked in the metal recycling industry.
Getting payment in some form other than cash doesn't deter people who were already willing to commit a crime. They have a buddy scrap it and the buddy takes a cut for taking on the risk.
Yards don't want the .gov snooping around because that never leads to anything good. At the very best it's a delay and distraction. So if you come in with something the .gov is going hard on this month (cats, railway cable, whatever) they will tell you to fuck off to some other yard. And when it's a PITA to fence shit shit doesn't get stolen. That's where you're getting your 30% reduction, not the law. The government is just such a PITA to deal with that scrap yards would rather leave money on the table than have to deal with officer Donut coming by every now and then to check their books.
I think you might have a point that this law may have also deterred 30% of legitimate copper scrap transactions, if basically it made scrap dealers decide not to bother with copper at all…
The U.S. has always been like this, especially since taking down the mob in the 70's and the War On Drugs in the 80's. Out of all the laws, most people aren't going to be hemmed up with catalytic converter KYC compared to things such as the War On Drugs and the watering down of the 4th amendment.
‘Bills of sale evidencing acquisition of all major component parts used to restore the vehicle. If the vehicle was wholly or partially restored with “used” parts, the receipts must contain the Vehicle Identification Number (VIN) of the vehicle(s) from which the part(s) were taken.’
The assumptions baked into your comment are probably the most Massachusetts thing I've heard all week.
The yard just has to check that the vins match the paperwork and that you match the name on the title.
Doors aren't serialized (models that put vehicle info on the driver's door not withstanding). Wheels aren't serialized. Those were sitting there because some employee wanted them, either for personal use or to sell.
Source: Worked in industry, in MA no less.
The fundamental problem here is that pretty much every car has a fairly unsecured cat underneath it and that law enforcement DGAF. The problem will persist until you fix one of those two.
I'd like to be respectable with regards to opposing views about this but wtf did people think would happen following these things?
This is uniquely a CA issue, some after-market vendors wont even sip to CA/NY; however, most states will allow you to retrieve them from junked cars and will personally do that for you if you are willing to pay for their time--most have pick a part solutions as it's cheaper on labour to do it that way since dismantling/sorting/testing is very labour/time intensive.
I bought a few ex manifolds and cats for several cars from other states and shipped into CA when I worked in the auto industry, it just wasn't cheap.
Because good luck getting a decent ex manifold for a 1968 BMW 2002 or 1991 850i from Bavaria and you will soon be so sticker shocked you will pay whatever it takes to get it state-side, especially since one of those cars is smog-exempt and the dealer is charging you every hour your car is taking up a rack waiting for the RO to be completed.
This is a long standing emissions law thing that predates theft issues.
They want people to drop big coin on something (be that an exhaust system or a vehicle financed at a borderline usury rate from the local BHPH lot) that will be in compliance for awhile rather than slap a used cat on that will barely pass the test and go out of compliance shortly thereafter.
They just want to get you on the road and they’re damn good about it (and to be fair much of what they do to pass actually fixes real issues - i went from being a gross polluter to passing when the mechanic replaced the spark plug wire that was grounding out).
>They just want to get you on the road and they’re damn good about it
Don't worry, the east coast has a solution for this harmonious alignment of business and customer incentives: 'safety' inspections
I took the training back when I lived in MA. The 3rd party that did the training (same contractor that did the computer systems at the time) basically said that the state's priority is clean air and that safety inspections only exist to make the combined safety+emissions license lucrative for a shop to hold and create an incentive not to subvert the interest of the state (by fudging emissions inspections) in favor of the customer (who the mechanic wants a good relationship with). Basically they want doing business via the state (by using your inspection license to make a bunch of work) to be more lucrative than any business you get helping customers dodge the state's interest. The lady running the training even started it by congratulating the class on "this lucrative next step in our careers and businesses" (which is somewhat hilarious because there is very little easy money in automotive repair).
That said, by the time I got out of that industry (mid 00s) they had stopped using tailpipe sniffers (at least in MA) and the economic realities of parts vs labor had more or less made any cheating beyond what the vehicle owner could do themselves irrelevant.
Last summer, I accompanied my son when he went across the state line to purchase a truck from a private seller. Said state has no inspection requirements. One of the seller's other trucks was a diesel conversion, and the exhaust was just routed up through the bonnet. Definitely no cat on that vehicle!
Nowadays the real emission inspection is the computer in the car itself, continually monitoring and tracking what is going on.
EGR valves -> DPFs -> DEF
I understand the necessity of these systems, but it seems like they are incredible fragile (the DPFs on VWs are prone to cracking and new ones are more than the average cat). I also understand why people do DPF deletes...
They should also consider targeting and auditing shops that buy used car parts
So, it'd eat into some of the criminal's profits, but probably not enough to significantly reduce theft. So efforts are likely better spent elsewhere.
Really wish the cops would download a list of who installed this app and find their location data on top of a map of reported thefts...
Uh... So, I too found the website and couldn't believe how brazen the business is. I too was surprised about the app. If I downloaded the app because I was so surprised, should my name be given to the police as part of this investigation?
That's ridiculous.
What?! Is Apple a co-conspirator then? What about the people who did app review? Should we round them up and charge them, too?
Probably not? Is doing something that is likely aiding in a crime, but that you don't know for certain is, enough to make you a co-conspirator? Does it change if you do it frequently enough that you're sure you've aided in a crime a fair number of times? I think not, but I'm not sure what the relevant legal standards are.
> What about the people who did app review
Even less likely than Apple, and even if it's technically illegal it would be a good exercise of prosecutorial discretion to not charge them.
An inadvertent customer of a criminal organization is still a customer of a criminal organization.
If you're not dealing in stolen catalytic converters not really sure why you would care if the cops know you downloaded an app for that.
Well, for starters, to prevent the police from kicking my door in and shooting me or my pets simply because I was placed on a list of people who downloaded an app. Simply "police chase and abandon leads all the time" is not a strong enough rationale to justify the original suggestion to me.
Here's what I _would_ be in favor of:
-Police bust Catalyic Converter Kingpin in one form or another
-Police learn in the course of investigation that said kingpin was a prolific user of said app
-Police subpoena the usernames of accounts that corresponded directly with the kingpin
There's a compromise to be had here without throwing 50,000 into a digital suspect bin when maybe half were people actually complicit to...wait for it...a crime.
I know the BLM astroturfing had a profound effect on the rest of the internet, but it’s disappointing to see such a skewed version of reality presented here on HN.
I just downloaded the app. Bring on the marauders. If they end up blasting me, you can start a charity in my honor, Vogt.
If somebody in power wants to make a name for themselves by starting a "war on cat thieves" or similar you may face the same treatment.
The people that were arrested accepted money from PV for the stolen property.
Nice try.
The world is a scary place, cops can be bastards, and terrible things have happened, but it's straight up hyperbole and nonsense to pretend that a random internet nerd is going to get killed by police because they downloaded an app. I downloaded it (it's crap, as expected), so if I'm wrong on this then I'm willing to face the music, yet somehow I think I'll sleep fine at night.
Looking back on the wording of my original reply, it was too hyperbolic. My post was not meant as an "ACAB, the police are literally here to kill you on behalf of rich old men". My position is that the fewer opportunities for folks to be thrown into a pile of suspects for the police or any other law enforcement institution like the FBI, the better. I'm in favor of the police being able to subpoena Apple and Google for user data if there's reasonable, articulable suspicion those users committed a crime. To me, simply downloading a publicly available app in the app store does not satisfy that condition.
In my country scrapped vehicles are issued a certificate that you can use to reclaim taxes. Maybe manufacturers should start adding unique codes to all parts so you can be sure it comes from a legitimate source.
This would be a massive time unless their goal is to find and harass every small time used car parts dealer.
Thieves don't really care about precise prices on cats. They just know that certain year/make/model ranges are what to go after.
The target market of this app is people who sell used car parts for money and want to know the value of the parts. When you are buying a random car for $500-1k with the intent of selling wheels/tires and a couple other big ticket items before scrapping the car for a couple hundred you care a lot about whether the cat is $200 or $1200 for obvious reasons.
That's one group of thieves selling 38 million worth to them. Later on in the document more groups of thieves are listed, getting paid 13, 45, and 6 million dollars. But that's still not necessarily the whole amount paid to thieves.
Also, it's quite possible that some of their business, and thus sales to refineries was legitimate. None of their partners are listed in the press release as being arrested.
And there are things we could do to make that easier, like putting a serial number on the converter on new cars and replacement parts. Requiring the make, model, and serial number of the car it was removed from, and a web site with a DB that has the ID number of cars they've been stolen from so buyers could check it.
Make those who buy and sell and steal them pay for it. For new car buyers all they be paying for is the addition of the serial number. Can't add much cost to engrave those during production.
Happens with guns.
But that’s why you criminalize the trade of unmarked parts. Actually makes the prosecutor’s job easy that way rather than proving the part was actually stolen and not your retirement cat investment.
Do you happen to have more information on that?
Other info is a google away, just search for reconstructed serial numbers or similar queries.
It’s not exactly a secret, but how successful it can be is.
So whomever grind the numbers off, may as well cut it open and extract the metals. It puts a major obstacle in the supply chain.
There are a lot of AC systems repaired at stations that don't even own a recovery machine. (This is legal, so long as the system has already leaked out to nothing before starting the repair. I suspect that gets a wink and a nod a fair amount of the time.)
Some refrigerants can only be legally sold to resellers or to users with an EPA certification. Sounds strict, huh? Well...the 609 certification test can be done online, is open book, and cost me $25 and 15 minutes to get.
Unless you're cool with the thefts that are going on, or think any government regulation is "overstepping."
Strawmanning anyone who disagrees with you makes your position look worse.
The grade isn't as pure as industrial processes, but it isn't too bad. Likewise, while the yield isn't good, even if you collect 50% the value is high enough.
I think it's a bit of a stretch to assume that entire illegal market could move offshore without a trace.
The other one is welding on the converter. It doesn't make it unstealable; but it's just not a quickie extraction anymore.
If your question is (as it should be), "What about legitimately fixing the converter? Can you still do that?" , I don't know.
So far it has worked. That is either because the vehicle has not been targeted (most likely case) or because the thieves saw who may have targeted it realized that there were easier vehicles to hit parked nearby (not unlikely but certainly less likely).
> Last year approximately 1,600 catalytic converters were reportedly stolen in California each month, and California accounts for 37% of all catalytic converter theft claims nationwide.
> The black-market price for catalytic converters can be above $1,000 each, depending on the type of vehicle and what state it is from.
> Defendants ... operated DG Auto... DG Auto sold the precious metal powders it processed from California and elsewhere to a metal refinery for over $545 million.
How did they make $545M in a racket whose upper limit on annual profit is a tenth of that? Perhaps that figure represents DG Auto's gross revenue, only a portion of which comes from recycling converters?
> How did they make $545M in a racket whose upper limit on annual profit is a tenth of that? Perhaps that figure represents DG Auto's gross revenue, only a portion of which comes from recycling converters?
Because the converters themselves are only worth $1k each on the black market, but apparently quite a bit more if stripped and processed further, to bare precious metal powders, which are much easier to work with.
It can't be.
/s
2) 1600 is just the number reported. I’d imagine not many people report the thefts, especially if your car insurance premiums will rise (insurance companies raise premiums even if you don’t make a claim if they have information that suggests your neighborhood or places you frequent are at increased risk of theft)
3) possibly the rate of catalytic converter thefts has risen dramatically in 2022 compared to 2021
This takedown seems to have been possible because there was a central group that was moving hundreds of millions of dollars of stolen goods - maybe even billions if you take "cost to manufacture" instead of "resell value". Why would a bike theft ring that centralized exist?
https://www.kiro7.com/news/bike-rack-chop-shop-growing-trend...
Bay area? i thought i was bad in Socal, I had my Gen 2 Prius siting outside a residential area near a major university town while I was away in EU and had mine stolen. I had to junk a decently running hybrid because of this as Toyota had a shortage of them and since the Prius was designed for the California market without the Toyota stamp on the cat its an instant fail for emissions, even if the ppms are within spec with an aftermarket part: no exceptions!
It's literally the most ironic thing I've experienced and I worked in the auto industry and at VW through Diesel gate!
This is so wide-spread and many good cars just ended up in the scrap yard when it was an easy fix to just allow for temp smog exemption, mine still for 40+mpg with worn batteries and thus exceeded most of what is sold on the market now, but because of regulatory capture and how insurance policy works it was the most expedient albeit wasteful solution--this is what I fear AI will bring about in most cases if left to its own devises and unchecked, too. Some made it to neighboring states without this requirement (OR/AZ/NV/CO) but the issue was logistical because you'd need a temp Cat installed to drive to said state, but in early '21 you could get them for <$1000 and recovered your costs as they soared in value as gas inflation pries kicked in gear.
I actually pitched this as a to a friend who was having his 1st kid at the time, he offered me funding (mid 5 figures) but I couldn't work with him due to the child so I left the idea and took off to EU instead. I had anticipated and projected healthy returns, $2k/unit after expenses, little did I know it would go to $7k+ per unit as I found my sources for the legwork: 49 state legal cats, mechanics to install, and drivers ready to go (mainly me). It's mainly what I had done at VW after all, logistically speaking.
There was a total parallel economy in shield installs, part/chassis swaps and tracking devises etc... because it got worse not better. I attribute a lot of this to the issue wit unemployment payments, and general lack of help for those during covid people got desperate and would probably be foisted into this easier than before.
Yea, they have the most PM of all cars on the road in the US; Toyota over built them as they were to be the California car and as you know many are still on the road as result of this over-engineering despite this high theft issue.
At least you got to keep yours, I bought mine as a salvage buy-back from it's original owner (2008 with only 72k miles) but it had a check engine light on it (p420/bad cat) since the accident.
I had the bare min liability since I was in Europe at the time and I was thinking of putting it on non-op. I installed a new cat in 2018 I bought from Toyota and drove it when I was in CA since I lived in CO most of the year when I lived in the US. I wanted a shield but most had mixed reviews. I left thinking our neighborhood is mainly family's and with so many at home during covid I'd be safe.
Wrong assumption on my part.
> I also had a shield installed after the first time,
Yeah, not all shields are built equally, some you can't even remove from the chassis after they're installed causing an issue with visual inspections and having automatic fails so they put little peek windows on them in later versions/iterations; hence the parallel economy that sprung over 2020-21 after many years of theft as it became so wide-spread, I was on Prius chat quite a lot those years and it was like every couple of hours you'd see a new member with a 'cat stolen' thread.
> Now, I have to garage the car at night by constantly moving home gym equipment, so my life is still somewhat negatively impacted to this day.
Well, you can always sell it, the premiums on them are so good on one in CA you can probably get something else if it's that much of an issue on you since things are likely to remain that way in the Bay Area.
But I'm guessing like most Prius owners, especially after all this ordeal, you will probably keep it until it dies at this point. When did yours get stolen and when was it replaced, most of 2021 Toyota was out of them [0] and did your insurance cover it with full coverage? What does it cost to insure now after this?
I scrapped mine because the tags were due and I couldn't find a cat without a massive premium and ultimately reporting it would increase insurance on all my cars and bikes and that wasn't worth it in the end.
0: https://www.torquenews.com/8113/toyota-prius-catalytic-conve...
Yes, I could sell it, but ultimately there's no better value until EV's are cheaper in a few years. It's an $8k car with a new battery that will likely go another 120k miles at 43mpg with $5 gas prices...
Did you encounter any research on what the best shield would be? I still haven't re-shielded it.
Lots, but as you an infer things have hanged sine '21, I think the best thing to do is go bak and read these threads [0], [1] and see what is available that has a peek window so you don't have to take it off when you do visual inspection for your smog test. And how the rattle mods were done, people were stuffing hokey pucks at one point.
Here is an example of what is happening in the bay area as you well know[2].
I wish I had the time to delve into it more, but sine I passed on getting the supply and scrapped my gen 2 it's not really the time-investment to see where an opportunity exists sine Toyota has been able to get more cats on the shelf, albeit it high mark-ups and some delays.
I hope you can keep yours on the road despite this streak of thefts, as they are utilitarian-speaking a solid car.
0: https://priuschat.com/threads/catshield-vs-catsecurity-catal...
1: https://priuschat.com/threads/best-catalytic-converter-anti-...
2: https://priuschat.com/threads/2013-prius-catalytic-converter...
There is no way in hell the buyers don't know the volume and source is complete wrong and criminal.
If no-one is buying they won't be stolen.
I sold my defective OEM Prius cat on EBay (I bought it knowing it was broken on my car and installed new in 2018) for parts to test how liquid the market was before I went looking for funding (post above) and doing DD and market research, it was rather easy and someone paid within two hours for the reserve price ($1000+).
Shipping was the biggest headache/cost of the whole process, but the guys on ebay buy Platinum, Platinum, Rhodium are still around.
While I don't deny some larger brokers at work, possibly OEMS, the fact is that everyone was grifting during covid, the stock market and real estate was soaring, corpo America (and the World) was flush wit bailout money etc... This wasn't even a blip on the radar of the billions being made.
Go after the recycling centers that buy these. Fine them into submission. Watch the market dry up.
I removed the exhaust from one of my vehicles about 15 years ago when I replaced the worn out engine and have had the old catalytic converter sitting around in my shop ever since.
The catalytic converter came from a 1992 model vehicle. The whole exhaust was replaced with a custom stainless steel exhaust front to back with a 50-state compliant catalytic converter in line from a well-known California supplier.
I intended to run it by the metal recycler several times but never made it and now that theft is such a huge problem I can see where just showing up with one to sell could be a problem.
I still own and drive the vehicle and could probably dig up documentation for the replacement exhaust system.
I'm glad to see a federal effort to stop these thefts. I had to install a cage around my kid's catalytic converter since there were thefts occurring from vehicles on their college campus.
My Ford was federally licensed rather than CARB, so I'm required to replace it with an OEM converter. There is no ETA on when one will be available.
If there is no ETA on when a new converter for your vehicle will be available are you not able to drive the vehicle at all? Is there no temporary option that can make it road-legal until the replacement arrives?
It seems like an exception should be federally issued for those caught up in this who have lost use of their vehicle. Dealers should be allowed to install a suitable replacement, non-OEM unit until an OEM is available. A note can be placed on the VIN with the state registrar that it has a temporary part so that it can be registered. I'd bet that if you did that and most vehicles showed to pass emissions with non-OEM parts in place that there would be a push to allow replacement with non-OEM parts.
Good luck.
Mine is an E450; There are a several companies that make an after-market cat for an E350 with the same engine. I contacted them and got roughly the same response from each:
> Unfortunately we do not have a catalytic converter for your vehicle. Although it may seem that the vehicles are similar, in reality they could be completely different when it comes to emissions. We've seen some cars that are the same year, same make, and even engine size, that use completely different catalytic converters. It has to do with the manufacturer and which emissions tier they are registering that vehicle for. That being said, although the E-350 maybe similar to the E-450, in reality the converters and emissions level could be completely different and that's probably why we don't have the certification for it. Sorry I couldn't help you out. Take care.
Good luck. It may be an option for you to sell the E450 to an out-of-state buyer and replace it with a used or new vehicle. I don't know whether you can make that work for yourself.
The conclusion I came to was that if I didn't look shady, the cats still had their mounting flanges on them (not sawed off), and no problem giving the recycling yard my contact info, I'd have no problems.
I wonder if this will make a dent in how often it happens. My niece's was stolen in broad daylight.
Many areas of the country there is no consequences.
Please consider applying the correct word to the context you wish to discuss.
IANAL, but I don't believe murder can only be if it's premeditated. In fact, IIUC, most murders are not premeditated.
Some examples:
Felony murder: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Felony_murder_rule
Depraved indifference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depraved-heart_murder
Murder without premeditation: https://www.floridatoday.com/story/news/crime/2019/11/20/kal...
I'm sure there are many other examples.
The fact that people keep talking about gun ownership in Texas like it's a deterrent is odd. It's not like the criminals don't have weapons too.
Getting pretty deep in the semantic weeds here though, and I feel obliged to say I have no horse in this race either way. Don't kill or murder me :)
Murder is the unlawful killing of another.
Homicide is human death by the hands of another human.
Murder is a legal term.
Please consider using the correct definitions of words when telling others to "please consider applying the correct word".
Theft is heavily correlated with the economy. Arguably it's a canary in the mine - you can very usually tell what's going to happen in the macroeconomics of an area by just following crime statistics.
"Deterrence" has generally been found to be a pretty well-rooted myth. Majority of theft also happens by people who _don't actually know what the consequences are_. So just increasing them doesn't actually help.
If you can show strong evidence that prison is one of the best ways of reducing crime, then sure you've convinced me (and probably plenty others).
Humans might learn from positive punishment and deterrence, dogs are less good at it.
I'm interested in learning more. Do you have some good resources you could point me to?
I don't have links to studies handy but those are terms to search around.
Besides, there’s way too much margin for error in vigilante justice. That’s why we have trials, imperfect as even they may be. They’re certainly better than empowering everyone to be judge, jury, and executioner because they thought you might be committing a property crime.
Have you seen the film "Bicycle Thieves"? If someone's property is his livelihood one can have sympathies for those defending it with extreme measures.
Generally speaking, no, of course not. But, if someone's breaking into your home in the middle of the night, you don't know what their intentions are to just steal some stuff or to rape and murder your family. There's a reason so many states have castle doctrine and such, and it's because there really are bad people out there.
I have medication I need to live. If I don’t take it regularly daily, a clock starts ticking. When the time is up, I die.
When I travel I treat my bags like my life. I recent had nasty run in with an airline that wanted me to check my bags. I refused to get on the plane.
When I took the next flight, my checked baggage didn’t make the connection.
I might have survived if I got to the ER fast enough. But those bags are my life.
In developing countries, petrol means access to medicine, food, etc.
“Property is more important than life” is a luxury belief for the wealthy and healthy.
If you don't mind my asking, what medication do you take?
"If it's not worth your life, then don't commit vehicle registration fraud."
When you infringe on the rights of another human being, you put yourself at their mercy. Some people are not very reasonable. Legal or illegal, you just might find yourself attacked by that person, possibly killed. Even if you make laws against it, there's always that danger. Every time you violate the rights of another person you're risking your life, and it doesn't matter what the law says.
If I catch someone stealing my car from my driveway at night, can I shoot them as they try to start the ignition?
If I see someone swiping my cell phone off my restaurant table while I'm turned around... shoot them?
What about my umbrella?
For instance, if I own a vehicle and it is my primary method of escape, and someone starts fucking with critical systems like say the exhaust with a sawzall, I woud definitely start fearing for my life and the life of my family. Particularly when automobile is absolutely critical for survival, access to grocery/medical care etc, escape from say criminals in your yard operating sawzalls in commission of felonies, in much of America. If someone is in my yard fucking with my way to get away in danger, and they're physically tearing it apart with a sawzall, then I think it would be reasonable to allow defense of my family.
If someone is just stealing a hood ornament with their hands, then no maybe it's unreasonable to fear for your life.
With a phone I think it would depend more on context. Intentionally and without consent stealing / disabling someone's method of calling for help and emergency could make a reasonable person fear for their life if that person was also in the process of commission of felonies in your immediate proximity with a dangerous sawzall.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/florida-father-son-shoo...
And catalytic converter theft is still very common. We are the #2 state on the list of catalytic converter thefts per 100k automobiles[3].
---
[1] https://statutes.capitol.texas.gov/Docs/PE/htm/PE.9.htm
[2] https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/gun-ownership-rates-by-stat...
[3] https://www.beenverified.com/data-analysis/catalytic-convert...
No emissions, low state taxes, low fuel price, and abysmally little to no self awareness about climate change is a better explanation.
FL is still the best way to get around smog stuff in the US because of inherit corruption, you an register anything if you have the money: see Motorex sandal And tis is despite Hawaii being closer to Japan and also not having emissions and regular departures to Long Beach.
Growing up, we used to take the car for a run up/down the highway for a bit to "burn things off" before getting an inspection. There were also places you could go "outside of town" that did not do emissions testings. That was 30 years ago though. I thought all inspections required emissions testing now. Is it still not enforced outside of town? Of course, finding the guy to pay off is always going to be available for skirting the reqs.
I sold a truck that I couldn't get inspected in Travis county (because of a sensor code that indicated misfires on start) to a buddy up in Lubbock, and it inspected just fine up there.
As in most of the US that have them barring California, which is Universal and why the BAR and OEMS has a 49 +1 system specifically for California, hence why the Prius was made for the California market yet suffering the most from this is ironic.
This what I found on emission on TX by county [0], and it looks a lot like Organ in that most don't do it except major metro areas.
0: https://www.emissions.org/loc/texas-emissions-testing/#count...
I think the proper solution to this is that car manufacturers should be required to better secure these things. Putting a thousand dollars or more in such an easy to access place, requiring people to have some of their money sitting there like that, might as well tie a bow around it and set it on the hood.
> the right to defend property with deadly force.
Which is not self-defense. You’re conflating the two and it’s a poor argument for taking a life over an exhaust pipe with some minerals in it.
I’ve spent a lot of time under a car and I can tell you I don’t think the solution is bolting the catalytic converter down tighter.
I think the problem is underlying societal collapse rather than consequences.
America is brutal on its poor. I know cause I grew up on food stamps and expired meat in Chemical Valley during the height of Dupont's C8 dumping.
People are soul crushingly desperate, but many don't even know it doesn't have to be this bad.
Also, in the absence of the war on drugs, you'd still have criminal gangs, so no, that has nothing to do with it.
Many reasons, but chief among them are that EU is oddly really relaxed on emissions (hence diesel gate not being as big of an issue in it's own Country) and don't use the same equipment on their cars also because AU/NZ are big markets for used Japanese export vehicles that have exceeded its Shakin/Km limits in Japan and there isn't the local demand for these components as the laws don't reflect such strict standards.
By contrast those cars are not legal in the US due to emissions, until they fall out of the testing period: see used the massive headache created with the post Motorex Nissan Skyline market by-laws. The UK is odd because MOT and carbon tax things play a part, but it's way easier to register a RHD car from Japan if you're outside of London, and even within it if you know where to go. But both the US and UK also have lots of poverty based crime (theft) underlying their society.
Europe, but especially Germany, has many auto-manufactures writing their laws for them; and the higher ubiquity of diesel cars on the road in those markets as opposed to benzene (gasoline) means they cannot just make them all vanish without having immense backlash. So, they greese the right wheels, and things carry on: business as usual.
I won't touch the other reasons, but if you really want the nitty-gritty of how relaxed EU standards are read: Faster, Higher, Farther.
There is a reason it was some college kids in CA with a home-brew emission tester in a rented Tdi that butsted VW, and not the EU's climate Nazis/Green party in Baden-Wuttenburg. (I lived there and was subject to their stupid vanity based green washing laws as an environmental activist, so I can say that!)
Please go right ahead though, seeing the failures of the punitive system in the US provides an exemplar of why my country should not go down that path.
I am glad they caught this ring, of course, but this is not meaningful crimefighting. The only message it sends is: the pole to the top is a bit greasy.
I think this is the law: https://oregon.public.law/statutes/ors_164.857
Who is creating a market for stolen catalytic converters? Are the precious metals being extracted, melted down and sold? to who and where?
Put THOSE people in jail for the rest of their lives and change the setup so there is in incentive for anyone to even steal one in the first place.
> They knowingly purchased stolen catalytic converters and, through a “de-canning” process, extracted the precious metal powders from the catalytic core. DG Auto sold the precious metal powders it processed from California and elsewhere to a metal refinery for over $545 million.
I mean, when you're buying refined precious metal powders from inside the US, it doesn't take a genius to figure out where it's coming from.
It's not really reasonable to hold the refinery at fault, they were working with another major business dealing in large numbers.
DG Auto is the right place to hit because they knew they were getting $38 million dollars of cats from 1 family and an unlicensed business (that family is also getting prosecuted).
You wouldn't hold a refinery at fault for smelting down cars they got from a junkyard. They have no reason to suspect the junkyard is sending them stolen goods. Any resell business that deals with individuals is where the pressure belongs.
Why not? They accepted $500mil of stolen property. It's only fair to take at least as much from them.
"I didn't know" is not an excuse. If you buy stolen car it will be taken away from you. You pay for your mistake and buying stolen goods is a mistake.
6. If any one steal the property of a temple or of the court, he shall be put to death, and also the one who receives the stolen thing from him shall be put to death.
9. If any one lose an article, and find it in the possession of another: if the person in whose possession the thing is found say "A merchant sold it to me, I paid for it before witnesses," and if the owner of the thing say, "I will bring witnesses who know my property," then shall the purchaser bring the merchant who sold it to him, and the witnesses before whom he bought it, and the owner shall bring witnesses who can identify his property. The judge shall examine their testimony--both of the witnesses before whom the price was paid, and of the witnesses who identify the lost article on oath. The merchant is then proved to be a thief and shall be put to death. The owner of the lost article receives his property, and he who bought it receives the money he paid from the estate of the merchant.
10. If the purchaser does not bring the merchant and the witnesses before whom he bought the article, but its owner bring witnesses who identify it, then the buyer is the thief and shall be put to death, and the owner receives the lost article.
The role of companies is to undertake risks in exchange for profit. They have all the incentives and tools to lower the risk they took wherever possible. If company can't be punished for buying stolen goods then there's no risk and society has to take the risk and the costs. Which makes no sense because whole purpose of private companies is offloading risk from the hands of people that don't want it into the hands of people that do.
You cannot but laws around forfeiture are weird. If what you own was involved in a crime it can be forfeitured even though you yourself are not charged with anything. And yes, that includes money too. It's from drug laws but I'd say it would better applied here.
> What you are suggesting would substantially impede legitimate commerce
Maybe it should be a bit impeded if unimpeded led to national crime wave.
Ivory, on the other hand, can be assumed to be illegally produced in 99% of the cases. If there are legal ways to even obtain new ivory, it's on the buyer to prove that their source is legal. That's not the case for catalytic cores.
There are legitimate sources for these precious metals, and legitimate uses too. The parallel to ivory doesn't make any sense in that you don't have to kill Elephants to get Rhodium.
This viral video of a catalytic converter thief in Bankstown Australia:
https://www.tiktok.com/@alfa_towing/video/715361999595885696...
In the meantime, I’ll be sticking with my Tesla, thanks.
Also, regenerative braking means you get a lot of power back when you go down the other side of a mountain.
Also fuel efficiency, and until very recently, diesel was cheaper than petrol here due to tax reasons. (even regular. Not Ag-diesel)
I'd get an electric car, if they were cheaper/available used. (road tax is based on CO2/km, so an electric one is free.)
If your converter is stolen, and a police report is filed, that vehicle is now emissions exempt for the rest of its life and can just have a straight pipe installed.
Now there’s a MASSIVE incentive on behalf of the state to solve the converter theft problem.
I obviously don't have any sympathy for these likely criminals, but unless i misunderstand it sounds like people lost their homes (civil asset forfeiture) before being convicted of a crime which I'm not sure is something to brag about.
Civil forfeiture may be unjust, but it is definitely a product of, and tightly governed by, law.
It is also irrelevant to this case, in which criminal, not civil, forfeiture is sought.
At the very least, I believe the assets would be returned to them if it turns out they are found not guilty. So they are seized but not gone for good.
https://www.reddit.com/r/h3h3productions/comments/ul2ar5/tha...
2: why did it take them this long?
Have you seen any videos of people sliding under a Tesla and somehow sawing out the ~800 pound battery pack and walking away?
Much of the reason why catalytic converter theft is so widespread is that it’s quick and easy. Not so for swiping an EV battery.
This is setting aside a larger problem: If you're under a car nabbing a catalytic converter you can quickly cut it loose, grab it, and run. If you're under en EV and manage to break the battery pack loose after several hours work, your remains will be pinned to the ground under that car later when the police come to investigate. People won't be stealing batteries and leaving EVs stranded for the same reason they aren't stealing diesel truck motors and leaving the trucks stranded.
Edit: Love the helpful comments though telling poor people just to move out of the city if their cat gets stolen, as if moving is easy if you can't afford to replace a cat.