Police Pose as Dealership Employees to Nab Alleged ID Thief
Detectives with the Indian River County (Fla.) Sheriff’s Office donned polo shirts borrowed from Linus Cadillac Buick GMC to catch a man accused of attempting to fraudulently acquire a $75,000 Cadillac Lyriq.
Sheriff’s detectives say the suspect, 40-year-old Philippe Canell of Fort Lauderdale, presented stolen identification to workers at the Vero Beach dealership and asked for the vehicle to be delivered to a nearby hotel.
“As the customer, potential customers started sending us information that we required, as we started gathering some of that information, the information did not look legitimate. It looked forged,” General Manager Stephen Nichols told CW34’s Al Pefley.
Police were contacted and, while Nichols coached detectives, Linus’s F&I department printed fake documents for Canell to sign. When he did, he was arrested, and the ensuing search of his vehicle and hotel room yielded a trove of driver’s licenses, passports and Social Security, credit and ATM cards, according to a sheriff’s office Facebook post.
