Florida Man Pleads Guilty in Motorcycle Theft Ring

Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum announced that a Lee County man has pleaded guilty for his involvement in a string of motorcycle thefts.

Christian Torres Lopez will be sentenced at a later date for participating in a motorcycle theft ring operating in Southwest Florida. He was prosecuted by the Attorney General’s Office of Statewide Prosecution.

Lopez, 28, was a member of the motorcycle theft ring which was reportedly responsible for a series of thefts from Sarasota County to Collier County. The investigation into the thefts began when a LoJack signal was received from a motorcycle that had been reported stolen from Sarasota. Detectives with the Grand Theft Auto Unit of the Lee County Sheriff’s Office tracked the signal to a warehouse that housed a motorcycle repair shop reportedly operated by Lopez, sparking the wide-ranging investigation into the theft ring.

Over the course of the investigation, detectives videotaped a co-conspirator transporting the stolen bikes back to the house of a reported ring leader, who had recruited him to participate in the thefts and eventual sales of the stolen bikes. The surveillance videos reportedly showed Lopez’s co-conspirator taking the bikes out of the garage to ride, and he was even caught on video tape riding one of the stolen bikes to a convenience store.

Lopez was arrested in October 2007. He pleaded guilty to the Honorable Edward Volz, Jr., of the Lee County Circuit Court and could face up to six months in jail, four years of probation, and restitution payments of up to $11,000 when sentenced at a later date. His co-conspirator is set to plead guilty next week to similar charges.