This is the dramatic moment investigators opened a shipping container at a UK port hiding three stolen pick-up trucks which were intended to be smuggled to Africa.
The three vehicles worth at least £40,000 each were found to have been stacked on top of each other in the container which was intercepted at Felixstowe in Suffolk.
Experts told a new Channel 4 Dispatches documentary that Hyundai, Kia, Toyota and Lexus cars were increasingly being stolen as well as higher-value Range Rovers.
The Middle East and Africa have a huge market for second-hand car parts, driving the demand for stolen cars in the UK which is also linked to illegal drugs market.
The sting was carried out by Adam Gibson, an officer from the National Vehicle Crime Intelligence Service (NaVCIS), a privately-funded force working with the UK police.
Mr Gibson could not reveal on camera why the containers he was checking were deemed suspicious amid fears such a revelation could give criminals an advantage.
But the clip showed his team opening up the unit at Felixstowe, which is the UK’s largest container port where 11,000 shipping containers pass through each day.
Investigators open up a shipping container at Felixstowe amid suspicions stolen cars are inside
Three stolen pick-up trucks are found inside the container which was meant to head to Africa
Felixstowe is the UK’s largest container port where 11,000 containers pass through each day
Inside the container he found three cars stacked on top of one another, all stolen and with falsified paperwork.
Mr Gibson said: ‘We’ve seen five cars in a container this size, so you’ll see quite quickly from the way it’s probably loaded that something’s not quite right.’
Looking inside, he added: ‘They’ve got £40,000 plus per car. That’s not how you load them in a container. This box is headed to Africa, which the roads out in Africa are obviously suited to this kind of thing.’
A white pick-up truck Mr Gibson found had a 2022 number plate – but he determined that it was actually made in 2023 and had been reported stolen from Kent in January.
He continued: ‘Whereas we were finding Range Rovers worth £150,000, we’re getting pickup trucks and SUVs worth £40,000 now.
In another clip, thieves revealed how they can steal a keyless car in less than 20 seconds
The thieves use an amplifier, which looks similar to a radio, to pick up the signal from the key
The car thieves drive away in footage which is part of the upcoming Dispatches investigation
‘We are seeing brands like Hyundai, Kia, Toyota, Lexus. So the quality has dropped off, I suppose, but the volume has gone up.’
Across three containers, Mr Gibson found 12 cars in total – with family photographs visible inside at least one of them.
He added: ‘Some gangs will literally gut the car of any personal effects. Others will just leave everything.
‘There’s kids’ seats, toys, all sorts of them. I’m constantly told by people that vehicle crime, where it’s victimless, it’s just the insurance companies.
‘Yes, the insurance company pay out, but we all get our premiums go up because the insurance aren’t going to absorb it. So it has a knock-on effect on everyone else.’
Last year the number of stolen vehicles recovered by NaVCIS increased to 589, having been at 76 in 2021 – and many of them had been broken down for parts.
Highly organised gangs are stealing cars then dismantling them at so called ‘chop shops’
A stolen blue Audi is tracked down in Lithuania – but a bunch of wires is all that is left of it
The documentary also obtained exclusive figures suggesting seven out of ten cars stolen in England and Wales are never recovered.
Freedom of Information requests to police forces in England and Wales also revealed that – for the 18 forces who responded – only 3.4 per cent of reports of a car being stolen between 2020 and 2024 led to someone being charged or summonsed.
Highly organised gangs are stealing cars then dismantling them at so called ‘chop shops’ before shipping them out of the country.
In one clip, two car thieves demonstrate how they can use keyless technology bought from the dark web how they can steal a car in just 20 seconds.
Dispatches: Britain’s Car Theft Gangs Exposed is on Channel 4 tomorrow at 8pm
