Man killed after interrupting suspected catalytic converter thieves in downtown Los Angeles

A man was shot and killed while interrupting three people who were trying to remove a catalytic converter from a vehicle in downtown Los Angeles early Saturday, police said.

The man encountered the suspects around 3:25 a.m. near Pico Boulevard and Hope Street, said Officer Jader Chaves, a Los Angeles police spokesman. One of them shot him before all three fled in a vehicle, Chaves said.

The victim, believed to be between 30 and 35 years old, was transported to a local hospital and pronounced dead.

No additional details were immediately available.

The catalytic converter, an exhaust emissions control device typically found in a vehicle’s undercarriage, contains precious metals like rhodium, palladium, and platinum. Thieves can make hundreds of dollars by selling them to auto parts suppliers or scrapyards, where they can melt them down and extract the high-value metals.

Catalytic converter thefts have skyrocketed in California during the COVID-19 pandemic, which some have attributed to an increase in economic distress. This trend has given rise to new state laws prohibiting recyclers from purchasing the part from anyone other than the legal owner or a licensed dealer and increasing penalties for buyers who fail to certify that a catalytic converter does not was not stolen.

Times writers Faith Pinho and Hannah Wiley contributed to this report.

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This story was originally published in the Los Angeles Times.