Police: CT towns ‘plagued with high-end auto thefts’

While the theft of multiple cars at one time is relatively uncommon, it is part of a larger trend involving ongoing organized crime rings of professional car thieves, police said.

The recent theft of five brand new Jeeps from a lot on West Putnam Avenue in Greenwich yielded highend profits for what was a fairly low-tech crime.

Earlier this month, thieves managed to force their way into a locked box at a small lot on the automotive stretch of Greenwich’s west end used as a transportation drop-off by Greenwich Chrysler Jeep, according to the auto theft specialist at Greenwich Police Department; with keys from the box, thieves made off with the vehicles.

It was a fairly common story, said Detective Anthony Fiscella, one that police around the region have seen before.

“They hit a key box that is accessible and then pry it open,” said Fiscella.

Calls and messages to Greenwich Chrysler Jeep were not returned.

A Toyota dealership in Greenwich was hit using the same tactics in 2019; Greenwich police and the New Haven office of the FBI later made arrests in that case. There have been a handful of “multi-car thefts” from dealerships in Greenwich over the past few years, the detective said.

Around the country, a number of car dealerships have been hit by thieves looking to steal keys — and then cars. A theft at a Chicago-area dealership, recorded on video, resulted in 14 cars being stolen earlier this year. A Detroit-area dealership had some $250,000 worth of cars stolen last year, after thieves pushed “blocker vehicles,” cars intended to shield high-priced cars, out of the way.

While the theft of multiple cars at one time is relatively uncommon, it is part of a larger trend involving ongoing organized crime rings of professional car thieves, police said. Thieves are targeting dealerships as well as high-end luxury vehicles in residential neighborhoods, which is a bigger problem for local law enforcement.

“The crux of our problem is we’re being burdened by organized ‘steal’ crews,” said Fiscella.

So far this year, more than 60 cars have been stolen in Greenwich, including the five taken from the lot last weekend — and all were taken with keys.

The organized crime rings, centered in New Jersey, are “gang related,” said Fiscella.

Typically, he said, “Younger members are used to perpetuate the crimes or thefts.”

Fiscella said more than 90 percent of the cars stolen in Greenwich are recovered. Looking at a list of vehicles stolen in Greenwich and later retrieved by other law enforcement agencies, a majority of them were found in northern New Jersey, although a few also turned up around Connecticut, and, in isolated instances, as far as Pennsylvania and Ohio.

“It’s not just Greenwich,” Fiscella notes. “It’s Darien, Westport — they’re all plagued with high-end auto thefts.”

The high-end cars that are recovered are all in perfect condition, the detective said, though in some cases thieves will try to remove any kind of GPS or tracking devices: “They want the vehicles whole, they want the vehicles pristine.”

The stolen cars are put into containers and shipped overseas, Fiscella said, with most of the vehicles headed for Africa.

At Cadillac of Greenwich, Eric Sandstrom, a vice president at the operation, knows all about the effort to steal cars and parts from dealerships, a criminal trend that became a serious problem several years ago in the field, he said.

“It’s been ongoing,” he said, with thieves also going after wheels, tires and catalytic converters in particular.

In late 2021, a shipping hub in Newark was raided by police, and numerous stolen cars were recovered. According to the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the vehicles are typically left in an open parking lot for several days, to wait and see if law enforcement authorities have tracked them. If not, the cars are then loaded onto a container ship bound for West Africa. In 2014, 160 stolen cars worth $8 million were recovered in New Jersey, and 23 alleged car traffickers were arrested.

According to a statement from CBP, “sophisticated organizations” with “transnational criminal networks” are responsible for the car thefts across the country.

In addition to professional thieves, juvenile thieves from around the region looking for cars to steal in Greenwich have also been a persistent problem for law enforcement, police said.

Greenwich police are working with the New Jersey State Police Auto Theft Task Force and other agencies around the region to combat the problem. Police have been urging the public to remove keys and starting devices from cars, and to never leave a car with its engine running in public even for an instant. Several cars have been stolen from motorists in Greenwich while operators were running minor chores, police said.

Fiscella said the department has been seeking to engage with local auto dealerships to add security features and tighten up policies on how cars are moved and stored.

Sandstrom, at Cadillac of Greenwich, said his business has substantially upgraded security at the dealership over the past several years.

“I have motion sensitive LED lights that light the property up like a ball field,” he said. He has also invested in a high-end video monitoring system, “and someone in Nebraska is monitoring our cameras and suspicious activity.”

Sandstrom, who also operates a dealership in Fairfield, said most dealerships in the region have installed fencing in recent years.

“You need good defenses,” he said, “But if someone wants something bad enough, they’ll find a way.”