2023-09-17 11:13:41
Car thefts are on the rise in Canada. In Toronto alone, there were approximately 9,500 in 2022 according to the Toronto Police Service. In Quebec, the increase in the number of thefts is 50% for the same year according to Association Équité, a young organization fighting against vehicle theft and defending users.
More and more networks are entering this segment because it is very profitable and low risk, explains Brian Gast, a former OPP investigator and vice-president of investigative services at Association Équité.
Increase in vehicle thefts in 2022
ProvinceAugmentationQuébec50 %Ontario48,3 %Atlantique34,5 %Alberta18,3 %
Source: Equity Association
From first contact to resale on another continent, Radio-Canada traces the most common stages of a stolen vehicle.
Step 1: open streets and parking lots
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Recent vehicles are spotted in public parking lots.
Photo : Radio-Canada / Illustration : Camile Gauthier
The first stage takes place in public space. Thieves spot recent models that interest them, for example, in shopping center parking lots. These are most often SUVs or pickup trucks like the Honda CR-V, Lexus RX Series, Toyota Highlander or Ford F150 Series. Once a vehicle of interest is spotted, thieves place a tracker so they can track it.
Step 2: home or private parking lots
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Thieves often act at night, when the streets are quiet.
Photo : Radio-Canada / Illustration : Camile Gauthier
Thieves most often operate at night, when vehicles are poorly monitored, whether in front of a house without a barrier, or parked on a residential street. The theft can take a few seconds, recalled York Regional Police Chief Jim MacSween at a press conference at the end of 2022.
Thieves can intercept the signal from the homeowner’s electronic key while standing near the door to open the vehicle’s doors and start it.
Step 3: a discreet unknown location, approximately 48 hours
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Stolen vehicles are often parked for a few days.
Photo : Radio-Canada / Illustration : Camile Gauthier
Thieves will often leave the vehicle parked for two to three days on a street. They will sometimes inspect the car, in particular to remove tracers from the owner or simply wait to see if the vehicle is recovered quickly. Nothing links them to the vehicle, emphasizes Brian Gast.
Step 4: Freight stations
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Stolen vehicles are transported in containers.
Photo : Radio-Canada / Illustration : Camile Gauthier
If the car has not moved, it is then sent to ports in eastern Canada. To achieve this, it is loaded into a container on a truck, then most often transported to one of the freight stations.
In Toronto, this is the Canadian Pacific freight station in Agincourt or the smaller Vaughan Intermodal station in the northwest, where vehicles were also found recently.
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The thieves operate with the help of an accomplice company which will indicate that these are different goods for export. Rail companies don’t know what’s really in the containers they transport, says Brian Gast.
Step 5: the port of Montreal (and sometimes Halifax)
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Containers are loaded onto ships, usually without being inspected first.
Photo : Radio-Canada / Illustration : Camile Gauthier
The trains arrive directly at the port of Montreal, where the container trains are then loaded onto boats. A small proportion of vehicles go further east, towards the Port of Halifax.
Vehicles do not come out of containers. Ports could therefore be an ideal place of control for the Canada Border Services Agency, but stolen vehicles are buried in the mass. These are just a few containers out of thousands, explains Brian Gast.
Step 6: Container departures across the Atlantic
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Cars are transported to other continents.
Photo : Radio-Canada / Illustration : Camile Gauthier
Once the vehicles are gone, it is much more difficult to recover stolen vehicles. Even if several international investigations have been successful in recent years.
Among the countries where Canadian vehicles have been intercepted are Ghana, Nigeria, Congo, Belgium, Morocco, Malta, Italy and the United Arab Emirates.
These networks must be very organized, because it takes people to steal, transport, and then recover the vehicles on another continent for resale directly or to other groups.
On the other hand, South America, Asia or Oceania do not return to destinations.
We are starting to see vehicles in the West being sent to Eastern ports, continues Brian Gast.
For the investigator, this reveals that the networks favor ports accessible by the Atlantic where their markets are the most developed. These sales can then finance other activities such as terrorism, he worries.
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