A stolen Audi that had been carjacked in Los Angeles crashed near 2nd Street and Colorado Avenue last Tuesday, touching off a chain of events that ended with four people in custody and three loaded handguns recovered, two of them untraceable ghost guns. Santa Monica police say the case started as a routine catalytic converter patrol near Ocean Avenue and quickly turned into a multi-agency carjacking investigation.
According to the Santa Monica Police Department, officers conducting a targeted catalytic converter enforcement operation spotted the black Audi near Ocean Avenue on August 25. The vehicle later crashed near 2nd Street and Colorado Avenue, and several occupants fled the scene on foot. A coordinated police response ultimately detained several people connected to the vehicle, and four individuals, including two juveniles, were taken into custody, the department said.
As officers converged on the crash, one unaffiliated individual removed a black backpack from the abandoned Audi and later discarded it in a nearby alley, per the department’s account. A second unaffiliated person then picked up the discarded backpack and attempted to conceal it at a nearby construction site. Police say they used SMART Center resources to locate that second individual, who was then taken into custody. Officers recovered the backpack and found it contained three loaded handguns, two of which were unserialized ghost guns.
How the SMART Center Tracked the Suspects
The real-time tracking that led officers to the backpack came from Santa Monica’s newly operational Santa Monica Analytical Real-Time Center, known as the SMART Center. The facility launched in April, backed by a $6.125 million grant from the California Board of State and Community Corrections awarded under the state’s Organized Retail Theft Prevention Grant Program, according to the Santa Monica Daily Press…