Officers said that 48 vehicles worth just under $4 million in total were recently seized as part of a covert Toronto police investigation focusing on stolen vehicles trafficking, shipping, and re-forging.

Speaking at a press conference in Toronto on Wednesday, the police provided details about two separate but related covert investigations, called Project Spectre and Project Paranoid.

Police continued that Project Spectre, an investigation into a network of individuals involved in drug and firearm smuggling, began in April 2023, and during this investigation, an undercover agent managed to purchase six illegal firearms and an amount of illicit drugs.

Pauline Gray told reporters that "the information obtained during Project Spectre led to a new investigation focusing on stolen vehicle trafficking, shipping, and re-forging."

According to Gray, seven suspects face 150 charges related to the two investigations.

The police said that 20 vehicles seized during Project Paranoid were recovered as part of a joint effort with the Halton Regional Police Service. They added that these vehicles have a total value of about one million dollars and were found at a shipping site in Burlington.

Steve Watts said that the police intercepted another twenty vehicles in Toronto and Montreal with the help of the Canadian Border Services Agency, and five of them were purchased by an undercover agent. Three others were found during search warrant executions.

He added: "During the investigation, several companies in the GTA area were identified as sites where stolen cars were stored and sold before being shipped abroad and/or re-registered and sold locally."

Ontario residents are "particularly vulnerable" to car theft

The investigation was conducted in cooperation with investigators from Équité, a national organization aimed at reducing and preventing insurance fraud and crime.

"In Canada, a vehicle is stolen every five minutes." Brian Gast, Vice President of Investigative Services at Équité, told reporters on Wednesday that vehicles targeted by organized crime groups in Ontario are newer and more valuable than ever.

"Since 2020, claim costs have increased by 319 percent. For the first time, Ontario saw over one billion dollars in auto theft claim costs in a single year in 2023.

Gast said that auto theft claim costs last year increased by $300 million compared to 2022.

"Profit margins are high and historically, the risk of consequences for criminals is low. As a result, stolen vehicles are frequently trafficked for funding and carrying out other criminal activities.

"Ontario's population size, the large number of targeted vehicles, and its proximity to the Port of Montreal make it particularly vulnerable.