More stolen cars coming across from Guatemala

On yesterday’s newscast we highlighted the lack of security regarding container shipments moving into Belize. But missing containers are not the only problem. Sitting on the Customs compound in Belize City are twelve late model vehicles, most of which are believed to have been stolen in Guatemala then smuggled into Belize. Comptroller of Customs, Gregory Gibson, says the Department has not only had to deal with the theft of these vehicles, but also their illegal licensing. The problem is not a new one, but has flourished over the past several years.

Gregory Gibson, Comptroller of Customs
“In instances, we are getting feedback which indicates that they’re stolen but in other instances there’s no report that they are stolen. It could be an insurance fraud in which case it’s reportedly stolen after it had been cleared. What the fraud tends to do is to introduce the vehicle initially into the transport system. You can’t find who introduced it and then sell it to a second person and then ultimately the third person, at which time we intercept it. That third person generally is innocent.”

“In most instances so far we’ve collected the duties and applied a penalty to the person who we found with the vehicle. We’re looking at a penalty for the administrative cost of the investigation, which may run around two thousand dollars in each case and then they’ll have to pay the duty. Most individuals who we catch with a vehicle at that stage may have gone to the bank to get a loan for just the purchase. You’re talking a vehicle that’s forty thousand, you have to come in and pay an additional forty thousand or sixty thousand, it could be quite troublesome noh.”

Gibson says the Customs Department has been conducting exercises since 2005 to identify these vehicles. He said that what contributes to the illegal trade is that Belize and Guatemala have not signed a treaty calling for the return of stolen vehicles to their country of origin.