French police have arrested 13 members of a criminal network specialising in the theft and trafficking of luxury cars.
The arrests were made last week.
The police have identified more than 170 vehicles transported by the network from Belgian, Dutch, French, German and Spanish ports to West Africa, Europol announced on Wednesday.
Several European countries, as well as Interpol and Europol, took part in the investigation, which began in the summer of 2021 and uncovered a major criminal network consisting mainly of French, Gambian and Senegalese nationals.
The organisation used groups of car thieves throughout France to obtain recent models of cars. It also recruited minors to drive the stolen vehicles to various European ports, from where they were hidden in containers and shipped to West Africa.
Searches were carried out at various locations in France and police apprehended 13 members of the criminal network, including its two most important coordinators in France, logisticians and car thieves.
Officers searched several homes and seized equipment used to steal cars, including illegal OBD port software, which allows thieves to access a car’s software, vehicle documents and cash.
Analysis of several seized mobile phones led to the identification of two containers containing nine stolen cars, which were immediately intercepted in the ports of Le Havre in France and Las Palmas in Spain.
