For thieves, grease is the word
Syndicate taps eateries’ oil tanks, sells sludge used to create biofuel
Where some see grease, others see gold. A criminal syndicate has developed a sophisticated scheme to steal used cooking oil set aside by local restaurants for sale to a third-party refiner and unload the cargo on the black market, according to a Buffalobased outfit that estimates it is losing $300,000 per week as a result of the thefts.
“It started two years ago and it has progressively gotten worse,” said Sumit Majumdar, president of Buffalo Biodiesel, which contracts with restaurants to purchase the oil and recycle it into renewable biofuels.
The scope of the illicit enterprise is staggering:
Thieves have executed at least 700 heists in every county in the Capital Region, siphoning oil from the grease-caked black storage vats inconspicuously located behind restaurants and ferrying away the sludge-like substance under the cloak of darkness.
Bandits recently targeted eight Schenectady venues in four days, making a beeline down upper State Street and siphoning grease from Prima Pizzeria, Vibez Bar & Lounge, Blue Ribbon Diner and CFC Halal Fried Chicken on June 17.
Over the next two days, thieves hit another State Street restaurant and took a detour into Burnt Hills before returning to target Boulevard Bowl and Morrette’s King Steakhouse, which are located across the street from each other on Erie Boulevard.
The string constitutes just some of the 60 known thefts in Schenectady County within the past two years, according to logs provided by Buffalo Biodiesel. Albany County has incurred nearly 300 thefts during the same time period, including dozens along Central Avenue and Wolf Road — even the Times Union Center, which the company flagged as one of its most hardest-hit locations.
The company keeps a tally and announces new thefts daily, including the Sake Bon Japanese Steakhouse and Caputo’s Pizzeria in Clifton Park on the same day last week.
“These thefts happen over and over again at the same locations,” Majumdar said.
It’s a lucrative operation: U.S. Department of Agriculture data reveals 100 pounds of so-called “yellow grease” currently sells for $44.50 — up from $25 just two years ago. Yet unlike the black boxes embedded in downed aircraft that investigators use to reconstruct disasters, empty vessels contain only sludgy residue representative of extreme frustration that amounts to $15 million in losses for Majumdar’s company annually.
Once transported into the containers by restaurants, the oil remains stored until Buffalo Biodiesel schedules pickups.
“We literally put the oil in and they give us a check,” said Morrette’s King Steakhouse owner Max Martin, who believes thieves are targeting small local operations that lack the resources to invest in extensive surveillance equipment.
Thieves gain access to the vats by either cutting a hole in steel grates or breaking the padlocks. They then siphon the yellow grease into tractor trucks or less-conspicuous panel vans, where the substance is carefully packed into plastic totes.
Surveillance video from one recent heist revealed a two-man operation approaching a site shortly before dawn.
One suspect gained access to the vat while his accomplice backed the truck into the enclosed storage area. As the man sucked out the grease, his accomplice kept watch. The siphoning itself took four minutes, and the entire operation was completed in fewer than 10 minutes.
Buffalo Biodisel, which has enlisted private investigators and launched a pressure campaign to convince law enforcement and local prosecutors to treat the thefts beyond isolated petty crimes, believes its stolen cargo is being transported across state lines.
After one suburban Albany business was hit, the company identified the truck by its signage and traced it to a location spotted four days earlier in New Jersey. A video showed the occupants being paid in cash after dropping off their presumably stolen haul, according to company officials.
Majumdar acknowledged the criminal network has offered bribes to his drivers.
“Our drivers have been approached and offered money,” Majumdar said.
The scope of the illicit enterprise, which sprawls across dozens of jurisdictions from Buffalo to the Hudson Valley and into Westchester County, has resulted in a patchwork approach by law enforcement.
Despite Albany County logging nearly 300 thefts, Albany County Sheriff Craig Apple said last Thursday no cases were under active investigation (but several thefts had previously been investigated in the Coeymans area that yielded no arrests, he said).
After discovering a theft, Buffalo Biodiesel sends letters to multiple agencies, including the FBI, U.S. Department of Homeland Security and local law enforcement — including the Albany County Sheriff ’s Office, which the business notified in two separate letters Dec. 8 following thefts from Northeast Restaurant II at Hannaford Plaza in Albany and Trackside Pizza in Ravena.
“This is not an isolated incident,” wrote Michael Seibert, Buffalo Biodisel’s chief corporate counsel to Apple. “Thieves are on schedules and routes, breaking into several locations in one night.” “In most cases,” Seibert wrote, “they move across state lines and launder the cash, mainly by wire transfer.”
Majumdar implored officials to view the thefts under the banner of a broader organized crime effort. Jurisdictional issues limit what local and state police can do, and he believes federal law enforcement is the only solution to stanch the bleeding.
There is precedent to launch investigations, Majumdar said. Federal indictments were handed down in 2019 to a syndicate that targeted one of his main competitors at the time, Darling Ingredients, in North Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia over a five-year span.
“At the end of the day, the feds are the only ones who can stop this,” Majumdar said.
The Albany City Police Department didn’t respond to a request for comment, nor did the Saratoga, Rensselaer and Schenectady county sheriff ’s offices. The Warren County Sheriff ’s Office said it had a couple a decade or so ago, but none recently.
State Police have launched a limited investigation.
“We’ve handled two in the Capital District and we’re currently investigating,” said Kerra Burns, a State Police spokeswoman.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office declined to comment.
In the meantime, Buffalo Biodiesel is continuing to take a whack-a-hole approach.
There appears to be no discernible pattern aside from identifying potential routes or circuits — one Apple theorizes may be selected based on the proximity to interstate highways.
“They could travel here,” Apple said, “steal and get out quick.”
Some patterns appear to be inexplicable: Among a tight cluster of restaurants in Rotterdam, Center Stage Deli and Yummy Yummy Kitchen have each been hit four times (and nearby Rooster’s, three times). Yet the adjacent Redwood Diner has not yet been targeted, according to a review of theft logs by the Times Union.
Visibility also does not appear to be a factor.
The containers are well-hidden in some locations, including the suburban Albany business that Buffalo Biodiesel had linked back to New Jersey, which stored its container in a narrow thoroughfare between the building and a densely wooded area.
Other businesses store their vats within full view of passerby and public surveillance networks.
Boulevard Bowl’s vat is located within sight of the camera networks that constitute the nerve center of Schenectady’s most technologically wired corridor, an experimental pilot program on Erie Boulevard that officials tout as the blueprint for monitoring traffic and testing new technology.
On June 20, the day Boulevard Bowl and Morrette’s were hit, 22,415 vehicles passed through the intersection of Erie Boulevard and Green Street, according to the city’s Signal Bureau.
At least one of them was the culprit.
City police, which received 19 reports of thefts as of last week, are reviewing camera footage and are working with the Capital Region Crime Analysis Center to link up with other agencies in order to share intelligence, said police spokesman Patrick Irwin.
Tracking precise losses can be tricky, said Buffalo Biodiesel officials, because thieves can repair grills or replace locks once they’ve been broken, which means it can be months before staffers realize something is amiss. In the meantime, they’ll continue to fill the vats with oil.
Sometimes the vat is drained; other times, small amounts are siphoned, according to a Times Union review of the company-provided logs of the nearly 300 Albany County thefts.
Martin believes nailing the suspects can be as simple as being on the lookout for the tanker trucks.
“They’re going to get caught eventually,” Martin said.
Yet cameras may not be a panacea. Still images provided by Buffalo Biodiesel to the Times Union documented suspects swapping license plates, to avoid detection on automatic plate readers or toll cameras.
“They picked the right victim,” Majumdar said.