Hundreds arrested in national crackdown on organised vehicle crime
More than 280 people have been arrested and eight suspected chop shops dismantled during a week-long national crackdown on organised vehicle crime.
Operation Alliances, led by the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) and funded by the Home Office, involved 32 police force areas and resulted in the recovery of 319 stolen vehicles worth more than £2.6m.
More than 100 warrants were executed and more than 280 stop searches carried out during the operation, which targeted criminal networks involved in vehicle theft and the handling and export of stolen vehicles. More than 50 charges have already been brought, with further expected to follow.
The operation also disrupted 20 organised crime groups linked to other offences including drug supply, firearms offences and burglary.
Chop shops – where stolen vehicles are stored, stripped for parts or fitted with cloned number plates – were uncovered by officers from the Metropolitan Police, South Wales Police, South Yorkshire Police, Warwickshire Police and West Midlands Police. Eighteen people arrested were linked to chop shop activity.
Police recovered more than 300 vehicle parts worth over £100,000, alongside equipment including cloned number plates, key programmers, signal jammers and licence plate printers. At ports, officers stopped and checked 1,090 vehicles, seizing 13 and making one arrest.
In one operation in Blackburn, Lancashire Police discovered a suspected chop shop and cannabis farm, recovering ten suspected stolen vehicles, 1,125 cannabis plants and about £15,000 in cash.
The Metropolitan Police also uncovered a suspected chop shop in an industrial unit in Romford, where seven stolen vehicles, parts from other vehicles and signal jammers were found.
Assistant Chief Constable Sarah Grahame, the NPCC lead for vehicle crime, said the operation demonstrated the benefits of forces and partner agencies sharing intelligence and targeting organised criminal networks.
She said police-recorded vehicle offences had fallen by 11% in the year to March 2026, but warned that organised vehicle crime remained a complex challenge because of the national and international nature of the offending.
The operation also involved the National Vehicle Crime Reduction Partnership, Opal and the National Vehicle Crime Intelligence Service.
Policing Minister Sarah Jones said vehicle theft was down 5% nationally and highlighted new legislation banning electronic tools used to steal vehicles.