After a two-year investigation, three men from California and 10 from Michigan were arrested for shipping vehicles rented from car rental chains in Michigan and Ohio to Turkey and Iraq, according to a Sept. 1 article in the Daily Tribune, a Michigan newspaper.
Exporting the luxury rental vehicles through Montreal, Quebec, the theft was led by Adnan Hana, 57, who would rent the vehicles and drive them through the border at Detroit or Port Huron to Canada, where he would then report the car as stolen or carjacked in Detroit. Hana would register the vehicles under his Detroit-based export agency Discount Auto Sales.
The group stole vehicles from companies such as Enterprise Rental in Sterling Heights, Mich., and Hertz Rental in Romulus, Mich. Cars stolen included the 2009 Chevrolet Tahoe and 2009 Infinity, as well as other Dodge and Toyota models.
The federal investigation is still underway.