Authorities take down one of the biggest auto theft rings ever in North Texas
NORTH TEXAS — One of the biggest auto theft rings ever in North Texas is no more.
Seven men were arrested for operating a multi-million dollar international operation that authorities believe involved hundreds of stolen vehicles right here in DFW.
Stolen luxury vehicles were seized by North Texas authorities in March during multiple SWAT raids in Garland and Dallas.
A total of seven men were arrested during an investigation Grapevine Police say started last November while examining security camera videos of a car theft in the parking lot of Grapevine Mills Mall.
"Our crime analyst saw a vehicle and said I think that's the vehicle from another one," said Amanda McNew, with the Grapevine Police Department. "After a lot of hours of investigation, they were able to identify a suspect vehicle and from there, it just snowballed and their investigation went wide open ... Police were able to recover enough visual and physical evidence from a single theft that successfully tied this crew to $5-10 million in stolen vehicles from within the City of Grapevinevalone."
McNew said there are at least 200 vehicles confirmed to be linked to the group along with dozens of other vehicle thefts, including outside Grapevine.
"Euless, Irving, Dallas, Grand Prairie, Addison and Garland were also linked to the suspects using sophisticated tracking technology and license plate readers once police identified one of the suspects," McNew said.
Vehicles targeted by the group include:
- Chevrolet Camaro
- Dodge Challenger
- Dodge Charger
- Jeep Cherokee
- Chevrolet Corvette
Authorities said Jose Ramon Perez posted photos of high-end stolen vehicles on social media from inside his garage days before a SWAT raid on his Garland home where police had "evidence that he may own a tiger which he keeps at his residence."
Police didn't find a tiger but towed away two high-end stolen vehicles, GPS trackers and a gun.
According to a search warrant, they also recovered high-tech devices that can reprogram key fobs of stolen vehicles.
Court documents reveal that Perez and others in the operation are accused of taking the stolen vehicles to "resell to unassuming buyers and have even been caught attempting to ship stolen vehicles south to Mexico and into other states in the US."
Authorities expect the case to go to the federal level.
Another raid at a home in Dallas found more evidence against the suspects who are believed to be responsible for at least 40 auto thefts in Dallas since the beginning of the year.
The arrests may have already had an impact on a crime that is hard to combat.
"I can tell you from our agency in Grapevine, we had zero auto thefts the month after we made those arrests," said McNew.
Grapevine Police said some members of this group had become more violent and at the time of their arrest had active warrants for aggravated robberies in Richardson and Dallas.
They are all charged with engaging in organized criminal activity, a first-degree felony.