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Mechanic Rich Pepe: Impressed with crooks’ talent.
Rising rare-metal prices have made this a desirable target for thieves in pandemic.
Rising prices for precious metals have focused thieves’ attentions on older-model Toyota Priuses — specifically on catalytic converters.
In the last three months, 24 people have reported thefts of the catalytic converters in New Haven, according to Assistant Police Chief Karl Jacobson.
Half of the thefts have been from Priuses, he said. The Westville neighborhood has been the hardest-hit.
The thieves strike at night. Several neighbors reported on a Westville listserv and at last week’s monthly Westville/West Hills Community Management Team (CMT) meeting that their cars had been parked on the street in front of their home when the thefts occurred.
“It’s somebody who knows what they’re doing, obviously,” Jacobson observed.
Most of the time no one notices until the next day —and they turn on the car, to be greeted by a deafening clang.
Actually I should say “we,” not “they.” The catalytic converter on our family’s 2008 Prius went missing the same night as the CMT meeting. So that makes 25 recent cases.
Our mechanic, Rich Pepe of Tripp’s Service Center on Whalley Avenue, wasn’t surprised to see the gizmo gone. Three other cases had preceded us.
A week earlier, my friend Mark Oppenheimer received a similar surprise when he got into his 2007 Prius, which was parked in front of his house one street over from ours in Westville. “As I drove off, I heard this crazy roar,” he recalled. And discovered he, too, had fallen victim.
This past Sunday thieves made off with “cats” below a 2005 Prius and an older-model Honda parked in the R&N Motors used-car lot in Hamden, according to owner Rich Nesto.
“A lot of places have been hit” lately, Nesto said.
Catalytic converters, part of a car’s exhaust system, filter our toxic fumes. They do so through three precious metals: rhodium, palladium and platinum. The prices of those metals have skyrocketed, so thieves can now recover up to $200 per converter at scrap yards.
That bounty is driving the recent cases, in the view of Tom Aquila of Aquila Motors.
Aquila said he was impressed by the precision of the thieves who removed the catalytic converters from two older Prisues on which he recently replaced stolen catalytic converters.
In the past these crimes usually affected taller vehicles with more room to scoot under, Aquila said. In these cases the thieves were able to get underneath the smaller cars and apparently used a Sawzall to cut out the back section of the converter, then unbolted the front from the engine.
“It was done cleanly,” he said.
Older-model Priuses are hardest hit for two reasons, according to this account: “In a hybrid car, the engine (and, therefore, the catalytic converter) doesn’t have to work as hard as it would in a traditional vehicle. As a result, there’s a better chance the cat will remain in good condition.” And “crooks find versions of the car built before 2011 particularly desirable because the cat is easy to access.” The older-model Honda Jazz is a popular target for similar reasons.
Some theorize that the pandemic may be contributing, with cars parked and unattended for longer periods while people work from home and avoid going out to socialize.
The thefts aren’t new. They’re not unique to New Haven. But they’ve been spiking.
“Massively spiking” in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, according to this Sept. 22 account. Seattle’s spiking, as well, with 514 Toyota Priuses hit in 2020 through the end of October.
Across the pond, London’s annual cases went from “hundreds” a year to 1,000 a month in 2020, according to the above news report.
Reports from a different jurisdiction portray the thieves as talented in their craft, able to slip under a car and emerge with the pricey part in under two minutes. Check out the above video for an example.
“We’ll be parking it in the driveway from now on,” Mark Oppenheimer said of his Prius.
Asst. Chief Jacobson included that among his tips for preventing thefts.
“Put your car in area where there is more light, a driveway if possible,” he said. Check it out if you “hear loud noises.” And activate your car alarm — an attempted theft would probably shake the vehicle and trigger it.
An Ohio company is marketing a “CatClamp” device to thwart thefts, as well.
The thieves who snagged our catalytic converter were, thankfully, particularly adept. At least according to mechanic Pepe. They made off with the converter, muffler, resonator, gasket, clamp, bolts, and downstream oxygen sensor. But they didn’t wreck other parts in the process. As a result, the bill came to $1,492.78. Other victims have been out as much as $2,000 or more.