Carjacking in Westport sign of ‘brazen’ daytime car theft, police say

WESTPORT — Police are still searching for the second assailant and the getaway driver in the recent violent carjacking of an Aston Martin captured on home security video inside the garage of a local home.

Westport police said they believe the homeowner and his wife were followed in their highend sports car to their house during the Sept. 17 incident.

Home surveillance video showed two assailants drag the man out of the car, punching and choking him, before they sped off in the Aston Martin

Police said the incident is an example of a growing trend of “brazen” daytime car thefts in Connecticut.

Authorities have charged a teen they believe was one of the assailants, but believe others are still at large.

“We are actively working on the theory that there’s a minimum of two,” Westport Police Lt. Eric Woods said. Those suspects are “obviously the other person that was in the video,” he said, and whoever was driving the stolen BMW, which police believe was a getaway car.

The warrant for the teen’s arrest showed police partially tracked the stolen vehicles tied to the group using a phone and AirPods that were left in the cars. But it was a tip from a witness that led police to a tan stucco house in Berlin where the garage was being used as a “chop shop,” the warrant stated.

At the home, police located several stolen vehicles, including the Aston Martin taken in Westport, the warrant stated. Police are also still investigating how the resident of the Berlin home is connected with the Waterbury teen they believe was one of the suspects who carjacked the Westport man.

The teen, 16-year-old Giovanni Lopez, has been charged as an adult with home invasion in the attack.

The Berlin resident, 39-yearold Derrick McGill, was charged with four counts of first-degree larceny of a motor vehicle, operating a chop shop, conspiracy to commit first-degree larceny and conspiracy to illegal operation of a chop shop.

Along with the stolen Aston Martin, Westport police said investigators located three other stolen cars at the home — a Porsche Macan GTS stolen in Rhode Island, a BMW X4 stolen in Ridgefield, a BMW sedan and a BMW SUV stolen in Westport.

But after he was freed on bond, McGill claimed he had “absolutely nothing to do” with the carjacking — despite a prosecutor noting in court that the victim’s credit card was found in his pocket.

Woods said it was “ludicrous” to believe that McGill was “just working on” the high-end cars that showed up in his driveway.

McGill is not believed to have been one of the assailants seen on the Westport home security video. He doesn’t physically match either of the two suspects seen in the video, Woods said.

“The Detective Bureau is still working this thing,” he said. “We’re working on connecting McGill to Lopez through forensic evidence, but we’re also actively working to try to identify others involved.”

According to the warrant for

Lopez’s arrest, the homeowner told police his wife had driven them home in the Aston Martin after they went out for lunch. She parked in the garage and he got in the driver’s seat to fix the the car’s Apple CarPlay system.

The video showed the two suspects, dressed in black and wearing face coverings, approach as he was sitting in the car. The two assailants demanded he get out of the vehicle. When he stayed put, the two carjackers dragged the man out by force, the video shows.

During the commotion, one of the thieves also attempted to steal another car parked in the four-bay garage, according to the warrant and video, but was thwarted because the key fob was not in the vehicle.

The video showed one of the assailants choked and punched the man, while the other backed the car out of the garage — even as the homeowner was stuck behind the car’s open door. The suspects then took off in the Aston Martin, the video shows.

Woods said in a situation when someone’s trying to take your property, police recommend not fighting.

“Your car can be replaced,” he said. “We’ll deal with arresting them and bringing them to justice at a later date.”

Woods said police have seen a “change in the trend” of cart thefts. Car thefts were typically committed at night when keys were left in unlocked vehicles, he said.

Prior to the carjacking, Woods said, “we started seeing cars taken in the middle of the day,” such as when people got out to bring groceries inside their homes.

Those “much more brazen” incidents increased the likelihood of confrontations between the car owners and the suspects, he said.

Woods said stolen cars would previously be recovered by police after the thieves took them on a joyride or tried to engage police in a pursuit.

“With this case, they’ve identified maybe there is something bigger, so that is part of the investigation,” Woods said.

“It’s obvious that there was some financial gain to be made,” he added.