Fiction Confronts Fact
Despite a number
of cultural representations that suggested otherwise, auto theft as it took
place during the recent past was more often than not a deadly serious activity.
This side of it was forcefully illustrated during Senate testimony given in
1979, when a hooded witness referred to as “John Smith” appeared before the
Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Committee on Governmental
Affairs. Smith was serving a five-year sentence for conspiracy to transport
stolen vehicles through interstate commerce, and freely admitted that he had
been a member of a ring of forty-five individuals operating in nine states and
Mexico. While the witness personally had been responsible for 1,500 auto
thefts; some members of the ring had cleared $200,000 a year from its operations.
Further, Smith echoed an old theme concerning deterrence: “I have never
encountered an automobile locking system that I could not defeat in a very few
minutes. I probably never could have gotten into illegal rebuilding if it hadn’t
been so easy to change the few vehicle identification numbers now on cars and
trucks.”11 Smith went on to outline the techniques and methods of
the professional auto thief of the 1970s, including giving details of how he
acquired the rosebud rivets that attached VIN plates to the vehicle; the
location of “confidential” VIN numbers that manufacturers stamped on frames,
marked on inner fenders, and spread on small pieces of paper throughout the
vehicles; and how a welding tool could erase motor numbers. Yet as the witness
painfully discovered, his attempts to obliterate a motor number was detected by
a National Automobile Theft Bureau (NATB)-developed infrared camera!
According to Smith, however, key
copying proved to be the least destructive and most effective technique to steal
a car. He preferred General Motors cars from the 1960s, for these models had
the same door and ignition keys. Once the door lock was removed and a dummy put
in its place, Smith said he would walk “off to my car, set down and tear the
lock apart and read the tumblers in it and cut a key for it. It would take
about 30 seconds . . . ”12 To counter the ease in which he did his
work, Smith stated that all manufacturers had to do was make their lock
components out of harder metal.
Key cutting, according to the
witness, was the “blue collar” approach to auto theft. He also had a “white collar
technique.” After finding the desired car, a thief would ascertain from a
license plate holder or dealer sticker where the car was purchased. The next
step was to use the license plate number to contact the department of motor vehicles,
which without checking the identity of the caller would furnish the name and
address of the owner. The thief would then wait until about 4:30 p.m. when
dealer staff was always at their busiest. Posing as a locksmith, the would-be
thief would state that a woman shopper has lost her keys at the mall. Hurried,
the dealer employee, without questioning, gave this “locksmith” the key code,
and the thief then had all the necessary key codes and tools from a product
purchased at a business that sells repossessor supplies! It was a clean and
easy way to do business, quite white collar in style.
Smith’s testimony was one important
source used to shed light on the activities of the car thief. However, a major
aim of the hearings was to uncover information related to criminal organizations
of the day, particularly the inner workings of the chop shop. Alex Jaroszewski,
at one time a mid-level operative in an extensive Chicago chop shop operation
with links to organized crime and in November 1979 in the federal witness
protection program, gave valuable testimony on the subject. He was gradually
brought into the ring in the 1970s by salvage yard owner Steve Ostrowsky. Over
time, Jasoszewski was increasingly given more responsibilities and began to
acquire knowledge of the top end of the business, including some of the illegal
activities headed by Jimmy, “the Bomber” Catuara. But first Jaroszewski had to
get the tools, techniques, shop, and connections with Ostrowsky’s south Chicago
salvage yard, where cars were stolen to order, parts selectively taken off the
hot cars, and then distributed in an extensive salvage yard network that was
connected by private phone lines throughout the Midwest. Jasoszewski later
recalled how chopping was done:
First, he [a mechanic] unbolted the
front end, which is the entire front section of the car including the fenders
and the hood. This is the most valuable part of the car because it is the
section most frequently damaged in accidents. The windshield was then cut out
and the doors unbolted and removed. Next, the seats were removed. Then, with a
torch, he cut the posts which connect the roof to the dashboard and cut through
the floor width-wise in the front seat area, enabling him to remove the entire
cowl. . . . This left him with the roof section of the car connected to the
back end which is often referred to in the salvage business as a rear clip.13
Once the car was dismantled, the
usable parts were taken to South Chicago Auto Parts, while the marked frame,
engine, transmission, and other components were carted to a crusher to be
recycled as scrap iron. It was a profitable activity, as these stolen parts
were sold at one-quarter or less the price of parts purchased from manufacturers,
and availability was almost immediate. The business, however, while on the
surface rather tame, had a violent undercurrent. As Jasoszewski discovered one
morning at breakfast, not only was his boss an enforcer for the Mob, but so was
his boss’ boss, a thug by the name of Billy Dauber, another salvage yard owner.
With Chicago police on the take, arrests occurred only rarely, and then release
was quick, with the police even returning tools! But the real danger that these
chop shop employees faced was from other gang members. In time Ostrowsky, his
partner Holzer, shop operator Timmy O’Brien, the big boss Catuara, enforcers
Richie Ferraro and Richard Pronger were all murdered in a territorial shakeup. For
a time afterwards, Billy Dauber emerged as second in command to Albert Tocco in
a new chop shop structure in Chicago.14
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