77 cars stolen by group of thieves from Toronto Pearson Airport in Mississauga and nearby

A high-ranking police official in Peel says car thieves target Mississauga and Brampton, in part, because the region is an attractive destination for people and it also houses Canada’s biggest and busiest airport.

“When we build a community that people want to come to, we have to understand there are people that want to come and prey on that community as well,” Peel Regional Police Deputy Chief Marc Andrews said Friday morning in an update on auto crime at the monthly Peel Police Services Board meeting.

The deputy chief brought board members up to speed on one of the more recent car theft busts by police in Peel.

Project Tallahassee, run out of the Peel police Airport Division’s Criminal Investigations Bureau, identified a “group that was targeting (cars in) parking lots in and around Pearson Airport” in Mississauga between May 1 and Sept. 1.

Andrews said investigators linked 77 car thefts to the group and that half of the stolen cars were recovered by police, “all of them in (shipping) containers in Montreal” that were destined for illegal sale overseas.

The other 50 per cent of the stolen vehicles, he added, are believed to have already been shipped abroad.

Peel Regional Police Deputy Chief Marc Andrews provided an update on car thefts for members of the Peel Police Services Board on Friday morning.

Andrews said nine people were arrested and charged in connection with the car thefts. They face a total of 135 charges, he added.

“I think this (investigation) highlights for us the transjurisdictional nature of crime,” Andrews told board members, adding it also speaks to some of the “soft costs” for Peel police associated “with having that monster (Pearson Airport) in our jurisdiction, with 50 million people travelling through there on a yearly basis.”

Andrews noted Peel police worked with police in Toronto, Hamilton and Halton in addition to other partners in running Project Tallahassee.

Peel police and local politicians have said on many occasions that Mississauga and Brampton have become hot spots for vehicle thefts in recent years. There are more car thefts, per capita, in Peel than anywhere else in Canada, Peel police Chief Nishan Duraiappah said earlier, adding the problem also goes well beyond the region’s borders.

“To say auto theft is an epidemic across Canada and Ontario would be an understatement,” Duraiappah has repeatedly said.

Carjackings also on the rise

In addition to parking lots and other public locations, car crooks many times steal luxury vehicles right from homeowners’ driveways in Mississauga and Brampton, and elsewhere.

Of additional concern to police is that auto thieves aren’t only targeting unoccupied vehicles, but they’re taking cars by violent means as carjackings are also on the rise in Peel and across Ontario.

In ongoing efforts to battle car thieves, Peel Regional Police hosted two major anti-auto theft conferences in Mississauga earlier this year.

In May, law enforcement officials from across North America and other groups impacted by the rise in auto thefts gathered over four days at the Mississauga Convention Centre for the 51st annual Vehicle Crimes Conference.

Two months earlier, in March, police met with members of the car and car insurance industries at a summit held at the Hyatt Mississauga hotel that was attended by more than 150 participants.

Those at the second annual Peel police Auto Theft Summit heard that all involved must up their game and work together if they’re to keep the fast-growing problem of auto theft from spiraling out of control.