An Irvine man orchestrated what amounts to a car-laundering scheme, buying stolen cars and trucks and reselling them with counterfeit identifiers, police allege.
The man, identified as 37-year-old Zihua Zhang, was arrested Thursday while driving a Dodge Durango SRT that Irvine police said had been stolen. At his residence in Woodbridge, police said they found a bigger prize: a stolen purple McLaren worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.
A detective with the Irvine Police Department had been tracking an auto theft operation, which led to the arrest. Zhang is accused of purchasing stolen luxury cars, replacing their vehicle identification numbers with fakes and selling them.
The Durango SRT that Zhang was driving when he was stopped Thursday had an altered VIN plate, police said in a statement.
Along with the McLaren, police said they found fraudulent VIN plates, license plates and checks at Zhang’s residence, as well as three unregistered firearms.
He was booked at Orange County jail. Irvine police did not disclose Monday whether Zhang remained in custody.
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