Veggie Bandits Steal $300,000 Worth Of Tomatoes, Cucumbers, And Meat

The rise in the cost of produce has led to a highly sophisticated vegetable theft ring, the New York Times reports. According to the article, thieves stole six tractor-trailers full of tomatoes and a truckload of cucumbers from growers in Florida, as well as a truck full of frozen meat. The total value of the heist: about $300,000.

“I’ve never experienced people targeting produce loads before,” said Shaun Leiker, an assistant manager at Allen Lund, a trucking broker in Oviedo, FL, that was hit multiple times by the veggie bandits.

The thieves set up a very sophisticated operation for the tomato theft, in which they created a bogus trucking company with the end goal of stealing large amounts of produce. The thieves even went so far as to register their phony trucking company with the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration in late February, around the time when vegetable prices were skyrocketing. They started monitoring brokers online who were looking to connect with trucking companies. They were eventually hired by a broker to pick up a tomato load from a Miami shipper March 28.

Over the course of four days, they picked up four additional loads of tomatoes, as well as cucumbers and frozen meat, from other Florida shippers. None of these loads made it to their destinations. Brokers and shippers believe the thieves had a buyer for all the stolen food.

“We’ve never seen anything like this,” said Bob Spencer, an owner of West Coast Tomato in Palmetto, FL, which lost about $42,000 in tomatoes – 40,000 pounds worth – in the theft ring.

Detectives in several Florida jurisdictions are working to get to the bottom of the crimes.

Source: “Price Of Tomatoes Has A Lot To Do With These Thefts,” The New York Times