Crook illegally tows 12 vehicles off streets of NYC to sells them for scrap: NYPD
NEW YORK -- A conniving crook has been busted for illegally towing a dozen vehicles off the streets of Brooklyn and Queens and selling them for scrap metal, police say.
Franklin Payne was arrested Monday for allegedly swiping the vehicles from East New York, Brooklyn, and southwest Queens between February and May.
Payne, 21, targeted Hondas, Nissans, Volkswagens, Kias and Fords as part of his audacious scheme, according to cops.
He always made sure the cars and SUVs he nabbed were more than eight years old so he wouldn’t have to provide the Long Island junkyard he towed them to with the vehicle’s title when selling it for scrap, police say.
He did have to fill out a form with the DMV claiming the junked vehicles were all his — which ultimately led to his arrest.
NYPD Auto Crime detectives routinely run the vehicle identification numbers of stolen cars in a national database to see if they were junked.
During one of these routine searches, cops learned several cars stolen in the East New York area within a three-month span were all crushed at the same Nassau County junkyard.
Digging deeper, cops checked the documentation on the scrapped vehicles filed with the state Department of Motor Vehicles, NYPD Sgt. Michael Alfano said.
“He signed a document establishing that he was the owner of the car he delivered,” Alfano said of Payne. “That’s how we got his name.”
After checking with the owners of the cars, obtaining surveillance video and interviewing workers at the junkyard, cops were able to track down Payne and his white Chevrolet Silverado pick-up truck, which he had outfitted to tow vehicles.
Payne lives in East New York near the Queens border, the exact same area where he is accused of stealing the vehicles from, cops said.
“The fact that all of the cars he was stealing were from one precinct was a real red flag for us,” said Alfano.
Nine of the purloined vehicles were from East New York. The other three were from Queens.
Alfano said stealing and then scrapping vehicles is a common scourge.
“It’s a very lucrative business,” Alfano said. “You can make a lot of money from the older and heavier cars than the newer cars. That’s why we check these avenues of investigation when a car goes missing.”
Payne is charged with 12 counts of car theft, criminal possession of stolen property and the unauthorized use of a motor vehicle. His arraignment in Brooklyn Criminal Court was pending Tuesday.
His arrest comes as the number of car thefts in the city have jumped 18% so far this year.
As of July 2, the NYPD has investigated 7,624 car thefts this year compared to 6,455 during the same time frame last year.
Car thieves have become increasingly sophisticated, using bootleg computer codes found on the internet to create their own electronic keys to reprogram a car’s computer system, driving off in the vehicle without setting off any alarms.
A massive uptick in Kia and Hyundai thefts this year was bolstered by social media challenges that showed how one can steal these cars with an iPhone charger.
Earlier this month, NYPD Chief of Patrol John Chell said the department is assigning more cops to work on auto theft cases to address the rise in crimes.
