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70 Police J. 348 (1997)
Car Crime: Fraud and Forgery

handle is hein.journals/policejl70 and id is 356 raw text is: ALLAN, ROBINSON CAR CRIME: FRAUD AND FORGERY The motor vehicle registration body, the DVLA, is strongly criticized by a recent document entitled Vehicle Title and Document Fraud produced by the Integrated Autocrime Project in the Thames Valley. But it is in failing to recognize that the Vehicle Indentification Number (VIN) plate fitted to all new cars is capable of forgery that the Home Office should also undergo strong criticism. The VIN plate is just like printing the key code to your house under the street number plate on the front door. Produced by the Thames Valley police, the British Vehicle Rental and Leasing Association, the DTI, the Credit Industry Fraud Avoidance System and the Retail Motor Industry Federation, the Vehicle Title and Document Fraud report states that more than half of the unrecovered 3,000 stolen cars each week in the UK were recycled into the second- hand market by way of a fraud practised against the purchaser. This purchaser is invariably a private individual who thought that he was buying a genuine second-hand bargain. The crook takes the cash; the customer eventually loses the car and cash. Surprisingly, the report states that a survey of private sale buyers of second-hand cars showed that 42 per cent bought privately, 17 per cent from a friend, and 25 per cent took the car on trust as to its history and ownership from a total stranger in the first meeting. Alarmingly, 18 per cent purchasing a used car had bought their car at a pub or a public meeting place; worse, many had allowed the vendor into their home instead of going to the vendor's address in order to verify his residence and actual ownership. Police despair of such simplistic behaviour and fraudsters rejoice at the ever-trusting car buyer. In fact, only 26 per cent of all second-hand car buyers bothered to check a vehicle's history through HPI, Retainacar or either the AA or RAC to obtain their intended purchase's provenance or background. Most simply handed over a substantial amount of hard-earned cash and put themselves immediately at risk of owning a stolen or ringed car with unrecoverable total financial loss when this came to notice. Such a discovery might not happen until the next MOT test or police stop, but generally occurs 100 per cent of the time. A cycle of criminal behaviour starts when a vehicle is stolen or illegally obtained and continues when a fraud is practised to obscure a car's correct identity and title of ownership. To complete the cycle, cash is then obtained from a bargain hunter who thinks he has beaten the system. Fraud and forgery Forged log books have been a prime source of crooked money for over The Police Journal October 1997

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