Thefts Are Sins Of Emission
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By VALERIE KALFRIN The Tampa Tribune

Published: Mar 2, 2007


TAMPA - The dirty engine parts piled into a shopping cart at an Ybor City salvage yard Thursday look like scrap but are easy money for thieves with handheld saws and about four minutes, police said.

Tampa is riding a national trend of thefts of catalytic converters - those antipollution devices that reduce tailpipe emissions. Thieves have crawled under cars at roughly 40 locations in the city since December to remove these parts from about 150 vehicles, police said.

They typically slice through the muffler pipe with a battery-powered, handheld saw, then sell the parts for about $60 each. A scrap yard can sell the parts to another venue for about $200 or more to extract the platinum and other precious metals inside, police said.

"It's a unique problem for us - and a national problem," Tampa police Detective Ashley Roberts said.

Police have accused at least two people of stealing catalytic converters. On Thursday, they charged two people at International Core Supply, a salvage business at 1717 E. Third Ave. in Ybor City, with dealing in stolen property.

But these thefts are so challenging, police have more investigation ahead. "It's kind of like finding a needle in a haystack," Roberts said.

Selling catalytic converters is not illegal. Stolen ones are tough to track because they have no unique serial numbers, Tampa police Capt. John Newman said.

In addition, many burglarized cars were parked at auto-body shops or left unattended for a while, so the missing parts were not reported immediately, he said.

An exception is the case of Ramiza Pilav, a cook at the Olive Garden at 2801 E. Busch Blvd. She and her manager discovered catalytic converters missing from their vehicles while at work Feb. 6, police said.

Pilav's auto repairs cost about $320 and were not covered by auto insurance, said her husband, Ibrahim Pilav.

Any car that starts without this part will sound "like the NASCAR speedway," Roberts said.

Removing the part is quick but also noisy, Newman added. "You're cutting a pipe the size of a muffler pipe. There's nothing quiet about this crime."

Police in January charged two Tampa men, Kelverick Lewis, 18, and Hasani Mobley, 24, both of Tampa, with felony grand theft in separate cases. When Lewis was arrested, police found three catalytic converters in his vehicle, two battery-powered saws and 40 saw blades, Roberts said.

Police served a search warrant on the salvage business Thursday after undercover officers sold a total of seven catalytic converters there for roughly $75 each, Roberts said.

The officers told the salvage workers the parts were stolen - one had a saw blade stuck in it. In fact, they removed the parts from scrap cars at the police salvage yard, Roberts said.

Arrested were Sandeep Sethi and a relative, Manpreet Khana, both 33, Roberts said.

Both were held Thursday night at Orient Road Jail on charges of dealing in stolen property. Bail for Khana, of Odessa, was set at $15,000, according to the sheriff's office.

To protect your vehicle, police suggest parking in a well-lit or highly visible place and calling 911 to report anything suspicious.

"If it's 2 o'clock in the morning and you hear work going on at the body shop, that's not normal," Newman said.

Reporter Valerie Kalfrin can be reached at (813) 259-7800.

They typically slice through the muffler pipe with a battery-powered, handheld saw, then sell the parts for about $60 each. A scrap yard can sell the parts to another venue for about $200 or more to extract the platinum and other precious metals inside, police said.