IAATI President Christopher McDonold - Left - Center - NCRC President Glenn Ebersold - Right IAATI Past President and Chair of the IAATI Award of Merit Committee - Glenn accepted the Award of Merit for the Indiana State Police and Secret Service who could not attend the seminar.

Det. Deron Brown (Left) - IAATI President Christopher McDonold (center) NICB Director Darrell “Rusty” Russell accepting IAATI Award of Merit.

The IAATI Award of Merit was created in 1992 to honor a person, group, department or company for outstanding contribution in the area of vehicle theft investigation or prevention.

This year found the committee found themselves in a quandary with the voting on the four submissions. After many discussions, two ended in a tie. For the fi rst time in many years, the committee decided to award two winners for the award.

The St. Lucie County, Florida Sheriff’s Offi ce shares the honors with the Indiana State Police and the Secret Service. Both of these winners conducted lengthy and well organized investigations.

In April, 2009, the St. Lucie Co. Sheriff’s Detectives Deron Brown and Rusty Russell opened up “Operation Grab Bag”. The investigation involved the sale of stolen vehicles with fraudulent vehicle identifi cation numbers (VIN’s) used to conceal their true identity. After recovering a single stolen vehicle, common denominators revolving around a grocery store and fraudulent North Carolina and New York titles caused the Detectives to sort through 80,000 registered vehicle records to identify potential VIN switched vehicles. The list was narrowed down to 6,000. That’s when they sought the assistance of Special Agent Price of the NICB. Together along with 12 other police agencies they investigated for a year and a half. The case culminated in September, 2010 with a total of 48 VIN switched vehicles identifi ed, 30 of which have been recovered and identi- fi ed as stolen with a value of $759,345.00. Arrest warrants were issued for three individuals involved in the case. Det. Brown and Det. Russell (now a NICB Agent), were presented the award at our seminar in Atlantic City.

Also winning the award was the Indiana State Police and the U S Secret Service. In May of 2009, Det. Mitch Blocher of the Indiana State Police was networking with others at an investigative meeting and was asked to look at 60 North Carolina vehicle titles. (Hey, does this sound familiar, like the above case also had North Carolina titles involved?) Within days Det. Blocher had tracked down and recovered 15 stolen cars and trucks. NICB Agents assisted Det. Blocher with the identifi cation of the vehicles. Each of these vehicles had been retagged with a counterfeit public VIN plate. Det. Blocher realized that he had multiple suspects and vehicles crossing state lines. He contacted Special Agent Danny DiRienzo of the U S Secret Service. Bloche and DiRienzo used informants, undercover sting operations, and a federal wire tap to conclude their complicated case. The end result was over 50 stolen vehicles recovered valued in excess of $2 million with fi ve individuals charged under federal indictments. Blocher and DiRienzo are still looking for 20 more possible VIN switched vehicles. Blocher and DiRienzo were unable to attend the Seminar in Atlantic City. The award was presented to Glenn Ebersold, President of the North Central Regional Chapter of IAATI. Glenn will present the award to Det. Blocher and Special Agent DiRienzo at a later time.