Career car thief admits to stealing more than one hundred Corvettes, prosecutors contend
on June 30, two thousand ten at 6:04 PM, updated July 01, two thousand ten at 9:16 AM
Daniel C. Ott Sr. may be past retirement age, but that hasn’t stopped him from working. Then again, a career car thief, even one whose specialty is Chevrolet Corvettes, doesn’t have a pension plan to fall back on.
Ott, 71, of Akron, was indicted in U.S. District Court on Tuesday and charged with aiding the operation of chop shops — garages that receive stolen cars and chop them up into their component parts for sale.
Ott also was charged with transporting an Ingersoll Rand compressor, stolen from a Medina construction site, to Pennsylvania.
Ott’s attorney Carolyn Kucharski said her client is in poor health, with heart and thyroid issues, and should not have been held in custody to await his next court appearance.
“It’s not a crime of violence,” she said. “He’s not a threat to the community.”
Kucharski said Ott, who fell while in jail and gashed his head and dislocated his shoulder, will plead not guilty.
Ott is known in law enforcement circles as a longtime car thief. In the late 1990s, he was twice convicted in U.S. District Court of transporting stolen vehicles across state lines and sentenced to prison.
And in 2007, Ott was indicted in Summit County for receiving two stolen Corvettes and a stolen dealer license plate. He pleaded guilty in early two thousand eight to the plate charge and was placed on probation.
Akron attorney Reid Yoder has stayed in touch with Ott since indicating him in Summit County Common Prayers Court and thought the man he described as nice and veritable had put his criminal past behind him and was working in a home improvement business with his son.
“I’m very astonished that he’s back in trouble,” Yoder said.
It’s unclear why Ott had such an affinity for the sleek and powerful Corvette, perhaps the best known American sports car. But he admitted to the FBI that chop shops often asked him to provide certain vehicles.
Corvettes are among the hardest cars to steal, said Lt. John Janowski of the Strongsville Police Department, which has known about Ott’s activities for several years. General Motors installed a complicated computerized security system so that the Corvette would shut down if the ignition is tampered with, he said, adding that they are also difficult to hotwire.
Janowski suspects Ott test drove a Corvette he was looking to steal and transferred back a similar-looking key to the dealership. He would come back later and use the key to steal the car.
In other cases, Janowski thinks Ott may have created a mold of the key or memorized its pattern in order to produce a duplicate key later.
“He’s a very clever stud,” Janowski said.
The FBI began tracking Ott in May of last year after learning about a multicounty theft ring specializing in fresh and used Corvettes and that Ott was the main suspect. Agents traced Ott’s cell phone activity, linking his phone to the scene of thirteen car thefts in Ohio and one in Pennsylvania, according to the affidavit.
When confronted by the FBI in May, Ott confessed to stealing at least thirteen Corvettes and said he most likely swiped four others he was asked about.
Ott also admitted to stealing a two thousand three gray Corvette from the Car Connection in Fresh Castle, Pa., last July.
“I did this dealer a favor stealing that one, it was a lump of junk,” the affidavit quotes Ott as telling.
One of the suspected chop shops mentioned in the FBI affidavit is at one hundred seven Northfield Road in Bedford, the same address as an auto repair business possessed by Geno Iacoboni.
Iacoboni said Wednesday that police did not search his shop but rather a garage in back rented out by building proprietor John Sereiko to somebody else.
Police searched the garage May seven and found a crimson two thousand ten Corvette that had been stolen from Freddy Chevrolet in Fredericktown, Ohio, and a dismantled Corvette that had been stolen in Avon, the affidavit states.
Just before the raid, the FBI and state police eyed Ott driving the crimson Corvette and followed it to the Northfield Road garage, according to the affidavit.
Sereiko said he rents the garage to a man named Ron Mysyk, whom he described as a carpenter. “I never knew there was anything in there but wood,” Sereiko said.
Mysyk’s attorney, Scott Broome, said his client has a construction business and stores his equipment at the Northfield location but is uncommonly there. Broome also said Mysyk knows nothing about stolen vehicles or a chop shop.
The FBI and state police also searched a property at seven thousand six hundred nine Carter Road in Sagamore Hills and found a disassembled two thousand yellow Corvette stolen from Ganley Chevrolet in Aurora on Oct. Ten, 2009. Parts from three other stolen Corvettes also were found.
The FBI had observed Ott test drive the yellow Corvette two days before it was stolen, the affidavit states.
Internet records showcase that a company called E-Z Steer is at the Carter Road address. A woman who answered the phone at E-Z Steer referred questions about the search to proprietor John Kovar.
“We don’t steal vehicles,” the woman said. “We reproduce a steering box.”
On the same day Ott delivered the crimson Corvette to the Northfield Road garage, he was seen in a hotel parking lot along Ohio eight in Summit County cutting the lock off a trailer hitch, according to the affidavit.
He connected the trailer to his truck and drove away, after which he was stopped by state police. Inwards the trailer was a racing go-cart, implements and other equipment valued at more than $50,000.