QC police alerts public to new modus operandi

QUEZON CITY, Philippines – The Quezon City Police District (QCPD) alerted on Friday secondhand car dealers to a scheme which involves thieves stealing back vehicles they had already sold.

In a press conference, QCPD director Chief Supt. Richard Albano advised buyers to make sure that the seller surrenders all the keys to the vehicle, including the car alarm remote.

“They should not buy [the vehicle] if all the keys are not turned over. It’s like a fast-break, [the car thieves] sell the car and then they steal it [back] later on to resell it,” Albano said.

The QCPD warned of the modus operandi after businesswoman Gatsby Fay Balanay recovered her white 1999 Honda VTEC SiR sedan (WCG 898) from the alleged thief, Mark Joseph Reyes.

The 19-year-old Reyes was arrested while he was having the vehicle renovated at an auto repair shop on Banawe Street on Sept. 5.

Balanay, who buys and sells secondhand vehicles, reported to authorities the theft of the car in front of her house in Manila on Aug. 28. She said she bought the vehicle a week ago from a buyer who was now under investigation.

Fortunately for Balanay, a relative of hers recognized the vehicle when he saw it at the car repair shop on Banawe Street.

The car still had its distinctive carbon fiber stickers and customized racing seats even though it bore a different license plate (WRK 718) which turned out to had been stolen from another white Honda sedan.

“I learned from the Highway Patrol Group that I was the third owner of a white Honda sedan whose car got stolen,” Balanay said.

After confirming that the car was hers, she called up the La Loma police station which sent men to the repair shop and arrested Reyes.

Reyes, the son of alleged car theft gang leader Mac Lester Reyes, was only 16 when he and his mother, Jasmin, were arrested for their involvement in the theft of the black Toyota Fortuner owned by Social Security System vice president Alfredo Villasanta.

The younger Reyes and a cohort were also tagged in the theft of a white Ford Escape in Cubao on May 30 while posing as agents of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency.