600 stolen vehicles recovered from sea containers in Montreal, most from Ontario

City News is reporting that "Provincial police along with Canada Border Service Agency officials say they have recovered almost 600 stolen vehicles as part of a four-month auto theft investigation involving police forces in Ontario and Quebec. Police officials say 75 per cent of the stolen vehicles recovered from sea containers in Montreal – or 483 – were from Ontario and had a potential value of almost $35 million."

"The operation, dubbed Project Vector, which ran from Dec. 12, 2023, to March 9, 2024, involved the inspection of almost 400 shipping containers and the recovery of 598 high-end vehicles, which have been connected to various types of vehicle crimes, including carjackings and home invasiona. OPP deputy commissioner Marty Kearns told reporters in Montreal on Wednesday that investigations by police in Ontario led them to believe that a large percentage of stolen vehicles in that province 'were destined for illegal export via the Port of Montreal.' As a result, he said, police and federal agencies in Quebec and Ontario launched Project Vector.

“'As our intelligence indicated, the vast majority of recovered stolen vehicles, more than 430, were taken from the Greater Toronto Area,' Kearns said. Thieves target relatively new vehicles, including high-end pickup trucks and SUVs, which are then exported to markets in Asia, Europe, Africa, the Middle East and South America, he said."

We saw this in the CBC report that covered the guy who tracked his stolen SUV through Apple Air Tags from Toronto to Montreal then to Dubai. This is a good start but it's just a start. We need more tracking and more cooperation between the ports, railway and the police. We also need bait cars because the same group of thugs are stealing a whole lot of cars.

Telling people to leave their car keys by the front door was criminally insane.