Bandit Cranes companies focus on victims of forest fires in Los Angeles

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Once Eaton Fire destroyed more than 9,400 structures In the Community of Altadan in January, the head of the Los Angeles County, Catherine Barger, saw an alarming publication on Facebook, entitled “The Hall of the Firefighters of Ethan’s Firefighters.”

A resident of Altadan posts that a trailers company called her husband in the middle of the fire, claiming that the city had authorized her to draw her car. Weeks later, they learned that the company had taken the vehicle to Ontario and asked for $ 3,000 to return it.

Other residents responded to the publication, reporting such fraud.

Barger asked residents to communicate with her if they had suspicious experiences with withdrawal companies In the middle of the forest fire, Helen Chavez Garcia, a spokesman for the supervisory authority, said.

“She thought it was outrageous for a person to experience this,” said Chavez Garcia. “As more information came to his office, we found that there were more people affected by it.”

When Barger contacted the work group against the fraud in the car insurance of the internal empire, he learned that Ethan’s fire was only the last time when the bandits for the Bandits attacked motorists, transporting caring cars to the cities of Riverside or San Bernardino.

“They did it before the perimeter was established before arriving (the California Patrol Road) while the fire was still active,” said the head of the working group, Sergeant Regina Garay. “Many people have filed complaints about theft of vehicles; The drawing companies took them. “

Authorities do not know how many cars were deceptively towed.

Last year, the Working Group, which includes the State Insurance Department, the California Road for Road Patrols and the Prosecutor’s Office of San Bernardino County, investigated and blamed 16 people Accused of stealing money, property or personal information in such incidents with car fraud from 2022. This alleged network of car fraud has made false vehicle insurance claims with a total of over $ 216,932, the insurance department said.

In these cases, unscrupulous crane operators responded to the reported accidents, saying they were the insurance companies of the drivers, the department said.

“(Drivers) are already nervous, frightened, maybe even injured,” Garay said. The withdrawal companies “draw the car to the body workshop and asked to sign documents, they were offered to take them home. And then they learned that the workshop kept his car in exchange for a monetary rescue … great rescue. “

Researchers have no evidence that cases of fraud networks were related to the incidents of the Ethan fire, Garay said.

“It’s not that you have to deal with the case directly, it’s just criminal cities,” he said.

The State Insurance Department has warned drivers who must be careful to certain warning signals. Crane drivers can occur within minutes of an incident, ask the driver to sign documents and then take the car to a specific workshop on the body instead of asking for the driver’s favorite workshop.

Anyone who suspects that the withdrawal company is not legitimate should check it with their insurance company or wait for the road patrol to confirm it. Drivers should not sign any document at the scene of the accident without contacting their insurance company.

Barger’s service said some survivors of forest fires are still trying to restore their cars.

“It seems disgusting that these fraudulent crane operators have benefited from the survivors of fire at the moment of grief,” Barger says in a statement. “Those behind this disgusting plan must take into account and appear before justice.”

This article was originally published by CalmattersS