Cops were suspicious of Tyler Curtis in part because they started arresting a lot of street cutters. They get a warrant for what's called a pole camera, which is like it sounds a camera that you put on a pole but surreptitiously. So probably like a fake utility guy goes out and climbs a pole, puts it outside of his place. And then they're watching his facility 24 hours a day and they start to see the volume that are coming in. He's really running a booming business. There's millions of dollars coming through and the crazy thing is that all of it is in cash.
Catalytic converters are a vital part of emissions reduction in gas-powered vehicles. But that’s not why they’ve been making headlines. Thieves across the US have been sawing them off cars because they contain precious metals like platinum, palladium and rhodium. Bloomberg Businessweek contributor Evan Ratliff is here to tell the tale of a $500 million catalytic converter theft ring—and how local police departments and federal law enforcement brought it down.
Read more: How Cops Cracked a $500 Million Catalytic Converter Crime Ring
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