62 vehicles located, recovery ops underway in South Florida

[BladesRobinson]

Dive Recovery Operation in suburban Boca Raton



Reporter: Paige Kornblue


Day one of a multi-agency "Dive Recovery Operation" is complete.

The operation started Monday in suburban Boca Raton near the Palm Beach County, Broward County line.

Cars are the targets. 62 cars to be exact.

Deputies dove in the canal last week. First to find the cars, then to mark them, and Monday, the recovery mission began.

When it comes to the unknown underwater, look no further than the Loxahatchee canal.

Palm Beach and Broward County Sheriff's deputies, Boca Raton and Delray Police Department Dive Teams and Sisters Towing made the process look easy.

Over 50 people were working to pull over 50 cars from the canal.
What side scan sonar sees, rescue divers discover.

"Finding the best place to hook up on the car and we tie off on a line to the vehicle, run all of our equipment to the point where the divers working and he'll back it up and tow trucks will pull it out," says Delray Beach Police Property Detective James Wintemute.

In an operation this size, investigators say 20 percent of the cars are typically related to accidental incidents or auto theft cases.

"Lox Road here, there is no lighting at night. It's very dark and easily accessible to drop a stolen car in here and nobody knows it's there," says Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office Sgt. George Grosso.

Grosso is a member of the PBSO Auto Theft Task Force.

Grosso says 80 percent of the recovered cars are often related to insurance fraud.

The National Insurance Crime Bureau helps identify the vehicles.

NICB officials say they are vehicles people dump in an effort to dump their car payments.

"This settles a lot of claims taking place with insurance companies and police reports by various agencies," says NICB Special Agent Herb Price.

Car models pulled from the canal Monday included a Camry, Corolla, Crown Victoria, and a BMW.

Experts say some cars have been underwater for 30 days, others for 30 years.

For the divers joining them, drysuits protect them from contamination.

It's a tough but desired task, despite the dirt, the muck, and the oil.

"These guys would be more than happy to do this all week," says Detective Wintemute.

32 cars were recovered from the canal one month ago.

One of those cars contained human remains from a missing persons case out of Broward County.

Deputies would not comment when asked if they're specifically searching for the white sedan believed to be involved in the murder of BSO Sgt. Chris Reyka of Wellington.

The "Dive Recovery Operation" is expected to last one week.




AN EARLIER RECOVERY OPERATION DISCUSSED AT:
http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/pu...escue-specialist-i-completed.html#post3061662

THE NPR LINK BELOW IS STILL ACTIVE AND REFERENCES THE WORK DONE BY THE DIVE TEAM IN FORT LAUDERDALE, FL...

Steve is the dive team leader for the Broward County Sheriffs Office Dive Team (Fort Lauderdale/Port Everglades). It was Steve's team that recovered 30-40 vehicles in one day diving a canal in their county. Steve has a LOT of experience (including locating drug containers fastened to ship hulls) and he is one of those guys I am proud to know.

Steve Salach, the DRI instructor who taught Mark's class was recently on the National Public Radio (NPR). If anyone is interested in hearing about some of the challenges we face on a regular basis in Florida, click on the attached hyperlink and hear Steve talk about one of his typical PSD operations. So far this year, he and his dive team members have recovered 140 vehicles during dive ops. I just pass this link along as FYI.

I think NPR did a good job on this interview.

NPR Audio Player

South Florida's Wetlands Serve Many Purposes

by Greg Allen
All Things Considered, August 22, 2007 · More than 2,000 miles of canals snake through South Florida — from the Everglades to the Keys. And love them or hate them, the area can't do without them.
They're crucial for flood control and serve as, among other things, habitat for alligators and a dump for stolen cars.

Thanks for the link to the NPR story it was very interesting. Steve had the picture as his wall paper on the computer. I asked him if this was from Hurricane Andrew or Katrina as it had all the cars grouped together. That is when he said this was one days recovery. Talk about job security!!

 

[dittrimd]

Blades,

If you can get the picture Steve had on his laptop of the cars out of the water that would be a cool picture to post. I was impressed by the wide range of years and the varying state of decay on the cars. It was an impressive picture!

Thanks for the article post.

 

[BladesRobinson]

If you can get the picture Steve had on his laptop of the cars out of the water that would be a cool picture to post.

I have uploaded the photo at:

ScubaBoard Gallery - 31 vehicles in 1 day - Powered by PhotoPost

This picture shows the 31 vehicles the BCSO team recovered in one day. In 2007, the team recovered 178 vehicles and in the first three weeks of 2008 had recovered nearly 40 vehicles.

 

[dittrimd]

Yup, that is the one. Very cool picture. Thanks Blades!!

 

[BladesRobinson]

The Broward County Sheriff's Office located approximately 70 vehicles yesterday and half way through their operation, they found skeletal remains inside a van. There is also a video link at: AP Video

One thing that is interesting is that the DEP was taking samples so they can file environmental charges against people responsible for ditching vehicles in the canals. It's a new angle and carries a pretty stiff penalty.
CORAL SPRINGS

Human bones found in old submerged van

BSO divers discovered clues to a three-decade-old missing-person case: human bones inside a van at the bottom of a canal.

Posted on Thu, Mar. 27, 2008


BY JASMINE KRIPALANI

jkripalani@MiamiHerald.com


JASMINE KRIPALANI/MIAMI HERALD STAFF
The old van in which human bones were discovered is cordoned off with crime-scene tape. Police say they are not yet certain whether the bones belong to the registered owner of the vehicle.



As investigators performed a routine search in a Broward canal for evidence of car insurance fraud, they found something they hadn't planned on: human bones inside a decades-old van that could help police solve a 30-year-old missing-person case.
Divers for the Broward Sheriff's Office on Wednesday morning pulled a corroded, muck-stained van out of a Coral Springs canal and spotted the bones inside it.
''The owner of the van was reported missing'' in the mid-1970s, said Sgt. Joe McHugh, Coral Springs police spokesman.
McHugh said police have tracked down relatives of the van's owner. They had moved out of state in the 30 years since the person disappeared.
''We are not disclosing when the person was missing. We don't want to tip off the suspect that we recovered evidence, if it is a foul-play case,'' McHugh said.
He also said police are not yet certain whether the human bones belong to the registered owner of the van.
Dr. Joshua Perper of the Broward County Medical Examiner's Office said investigators will examine the bones to determine the person's gender, race and approximate age.
''There's a good chance we will identify this person,'' Perper said.
When the bones were found, deputies quickly cordoned off the crime scene with yellow tape.
A member of the BSO dive team scraped the muck off the old license plate with his gloved hand, but it was too rusty to read. So, they used the vehicle identification number etched on the van.
BSO divers and deputies found the bones during a cleanup aimed at pulling out vehicles that are often dumped in the canal by owners who report them as stolen. The canal is along Southgate Boulevard at Nob Hill Road, and divides Coral Springs and Tamarac.
Officials are pretty certain when the vehicle is tied to fraud because the insurance scammer often leaves the keys in the ignition, Broward Sheriff Al Lamberti said.
''This [canal] has always been a popular dumping ground,'' Lamberti said of the C-14 canal off the Sawgrass Expressway.
Lamberti said that when the waters are still, a BSO helicopter crew member flying 500 feet above the canal can spot the vehicles. ''And they count how many they find,'' Lamberti said.
About 70 vehicles were spotted in the canal before the divers began searching on Tuesday.
By Wednesday afternoon, BSO crews had already pulled 24 vehicles out of the canal, said Broward Sheriff Fire Rescue spokesman Mike Jachles.
This year, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection also sent agents to take water samples from the gas tanks and the batteries.
''To prove that it's hazardous waste and that it was improperly disposed of,'' said DEP Special Agent Sammy Williams.
Insurance scammers could face a third-degree felony conviction, which carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison and a $5,000 fine. They could also face another felony charge from the DEP, Williams said.
But that's only if the crime was committed within the past eight years. Otherwise, the statute of limitations would bar any prosecution, said Ed Walsh, a senior supervisor for the Broward state attorney's office.
Most cars had insurance companies listed as their owners and the most common one was State Farm, said Tony Fernandez, special agent of the National Insurance Crime Bureau.
State Farm insurance spokesman Michael Grimes said BSO's investigation might also help the company recoup payouts.
''If we find it was some sort of fraud, we would ask the insured to pay the money back they received,'' Grimes said.
German Gonzalez, 57, who lives near the canal, said he often sees suspicious activity there.
''One morning, I saw people burning a car and when I got back, the car wasn't there,'' Gonzalez said.

 

[ditch-diver]

Great stuff guys..., love the pic of all the cars. Please keep us updated on the bones story, I`m curious to know the outcome of that one. That`s a new one for me.., never got bones in a car although did set that scenario up for newbie`s last year for training. Just validated my scenario, thanks!!

J