My name is Hondo Underwood. I stole cars valued at over $1 million. Some were stolen to order.
Some went to chop shops. This is how crime works. I've probably stole 200 to 300 vehicles. To me, once I got proficient at stealing, there was no time of day that was safe. I would be even fine
with stealing a vehicle while you're sitting on your couch. I've put a lot of people in harm's way. Not just myself, not just the other people
that were on the road, but also the police officers that were involved in
chasing me and pursuing me. As a Marine, or a former Marine, I'm always aware of my
surroundings no matter what, even to this day. But when you mix former military attention
to detail and drugs, it enhances that even more, especially when you're in a stolen vehicle and running from the police. There's been high-speed
chases that I've been in five, six times in a day that range anywhere from
30 seconds to five minutes. The police officers that were tailing me were not just regular
uniformed police officers. It was a C-MATT team. It was
the auto theft task force out of Denver, Lakewood, Jefferson County. And at that point in time in 2017, police officers were going
through this, I guess, phase where they're not supposed to
pursue high-speed getaways. There was times where I
would taunt the police. I'd see them, and they were just waiting
for me to make that move. There was times where I'd wave at them. There was times where I'd flip them off. There was times that I'd
just drive by and smile, because I knew they weren't
going to do nothing. And when they did, they
knew I was getting away. It was definitely an experience where it went from nervousness
to, OK, let's have fun. It was a rough game of cat and mouse. There were times that I
was in a stolen vehicle and I pulled a gun on an undercover cop. And I didn't realize it
was an undercover cop until he reached for his radio. Maybe two, three weeks
later, I was apprehended by 32 police officers. I stole cars between 2016 and I was apprehended in 2017. During the first time,
I was selling drugs, and I started using them as well. The first vehicle that I ever stole was a older-model Suburban. The ignitions are very easy to disable and start the vehicle. Essentially, it was in a
parking lot where it was low-lit and plenty of vehicles
around, so nobody really, it was kind of under cover. I felt a sense of rush,
like an adrenaline rush, where I'm like, well, what do we do next? Where's the next one? It was almost an addiction to doing it. From there, moved on from
a Suburban to Dodge Rams, F-350s, Cadillac Escalades. And reason being is they
were all very similar in a sense of design and security. In the beginning, I had
a fascination with keys. I was using jiggler keys
to start the ignitions. I could take any kind of key, and if it was shaved down correctly, I can open up any kind of
padlock, vehicle locks. But it was pretty much
the luck of the draw whether or not it was going to work. So after that, I discarded the keys and found other ways that were
guaranteed 100% of the time to be able to start and drive off. So then I got into
flatheads and Vise-Grips. Flathead was able to open the vehicle just like a jiggler key, break off glow rings, they're called, on the vehicles where the ignition is at, and put a set of Vise-Grips around them and just pretty much turn them forward and use the flathead to
then start the vehicle. In the beginning, to steal a vehicle, it was anywhere from one to five minutes. During that time, I used a
lookout and a getaway car. It got down to six to seven seconds that I was stealing a vehicle. I'd try to keep my personal
baggage at a minimum. Just because if I had to
jump out of a vehicle, the chances of leaving
things behind were greater. But there were a lot of times
I had anywhere from handguns to shotguns to fully automatic weapons. There was a time where I
remember pulling up to a house. The vehicle was parked across the street. There was a family sitting
in their living room. And with the blinds open, you can see them sitting
there watching TV. I started the truck, and
as I was driving off, I remember them looking out. What was going through their mind? What was going through my mind? I don't believe that car
theft is a victimless crime. When you steal somebody's car, you're also stealing their ways to work, to get food for their children. You never know the
circumstances somebody's in. And when you're high,
when you're on drugs, you don't care about that. You don't care about yourself,
let alone anybody else. The organizations that I
worked for had a lot of power and a lot of money. Almost unlimited. When I first started
interacting with them, it was because I was selling drugs. It was a slow, progressive relationship. I never really asked questions as to what the vehicles were
going to be then used for. To me, it was just the money. If it was more of a smaller vehicle, I'd make anywhere from $200 to $500. If it was a bigger vehicle, and I knew, especially if they gave me details of something they had in mind and I knew what money they can be making, that price goes up. I can make anywhere from,
on a bigger vehicle, $1,000 to $10,000. To get five, 10 vehicles at $5,000 apiece in six seconds each, I can make $50,000 in under an hour. Some of the vehicles that I
have stolen went to El Paso. Texas is known for cartel-related crimes and thefts. There were vehicles that I know that went across the border to Mexico. A lot of SUVs, bigger
Suburbans and stuff like that were used to either package and transport drugs or guns or money. Taking cars out of state was risky because I'm getting into territory where I don't know the roads. But it was something that I
would do if the money was right. There were times that I was accompanied, because if I had somebody who wanted 15 vehicles out of state, I'm going to need 14 other drivers and I'm also going to need a ride back. The people that I would
sell to on the streets were using them for crimes
or just to get around. The bigger F-350s, Escalades, Excursions, Tahoes are more on demand because
they're work vehicles. They can haul a bigger load, whether it be drugs, stolen merchandise. And there are so many of them made, so they're not easily
spotted if it's stolen. They're all built the same. You could interchange the parts. They're fast vehicles,
they're big vehicles, especially once you get into the F-350s, the Super Duties, the turbo-diesels. A lot of times I took into account that the bigger the vehicle,
the cops won't stop. The cops won't hit it. Smaller cars were not something
I'd steal on the regular. I would stay away from
vehicles that were chipped or vehicles that had OnStar for the simple fact is
that they can be traced, and I wasn't one to be
into computer programs. To me, that was too much
time, too much effort. And you have to commit one crime to commit a crime of auto
theft for that vehicle. I have taken a few vehicles to
chop shops to be disassembled and parts to be spread out, whether it be cosmetic or internal as far as motors and engines,
tires, rims, things like that. A vehicle that goes to a chop shop can pretty much be
completely 100% disassembled, just like if it was in the factory. A chop shop visually is no different than a regular mechanic shop or the mechanic shop at a dealership. The first time I went to a chop shop, I had no idea that it was a chop shop. Most chop shops are legal businesses. It's easier to get away with
by having a legit business than it is to have just
a hole-in-the-wall shop. To strip out one kind of vehicle can take a chop shop anywhere
from an hour to three hours, depending on the parts that they wanted and what they were able
to do with the manpower. The person stealing the vehicle
gets paid the least amount because when you take
time to part anything out, you get paid a lot more. If you're selling piece by piece, you're getting paid $100 here,
$1,000 there, $2,000 here. The most valuable parts
is the engine, for one. Rims, tires, suspension, surround-sound systems. A new thing that people
do is cloning vehicles. You have a vehicle that's 100% legit and another vehicle that's
cloned to match the appearance and year, make, model. And they have VIN printers that you can duplicate that VIN, so now you have two vehicles
that are actually one. Even if it's stolen, they won't know unless they really search for it. When I grew up playing "Grand Theft Auto," to me it was like, wow, you can do anything
and everything you want. So much adrenaline. Running
from cops, shooting at people. "Grand Theft Auto" was more of a violent experience. I tried to never have contact
with owners or people. I never liked to steal cars with keys that were already inside of them or that were already running. Not only because I didn't
want to have that violence with somebody that was undeserving of it, but I also didn't want to be spotted and pointed out by police
officers or told on. To me, the video game should
have never been created. It does show a lot to kids as to what you can really do in real life. "Gone in 60 Seconds" was a neat movie, but it's not common for
somebody to buy a vehicle that stands out that's already stolen. It's going to be recovered. I would stay away from vehicles
that were more expensive. The more expensive vehicles
carried the higher crime. If you got caught for it,
longer prison sentence. I personally did have a small team, but I liked to do it on my own. I liked to be the all-star. I liked to be the star of the movie. When you start putting out
action movies like that, you also get people curious
as to how it's done. So, I hate to use the term,
but it's going on everywhere. The Kia Boys. Kias have been known to be
very good, reliable vehicles. They're nice. But again, I think if
I was to steal a Kia, what would I do with it? They're small. They may be kind of sporty, kind of fast. But personally, I couldn't do anything other than take the rims off of it. So when I think about this Kia Boy trend, to me it's ridiculous. It's a bunch of people joyriding. They're not making money. All they're doing is causing
damage and destroying lives. I grew up in a single home with my mother. Gangs became a part of my
life when I met my dad. He lived in a pretty bad neighborhood, or a rough neighborhood,
where gangs were everywhere. Maybe not so much gangs, but gangsters or thugs. And that's what I pulled myself to, because they were older, because I felt a sense of guidance. Once I graduated high school,
I joined the military. December 3rd, 2007, I joined boot camp. It was amazing. I was like, wow, I finally did something with myself. But was it really my dreams
to be a Marine? It never was. So I got out of the military,
honorable discharge. I pursued music. I'd go around touring, show to show, state to state, city to city. I had this feeling of a climax, so to say, because there were fans
that looked up to us, that idolized us. Then in 2014, I was shot
three times in Las Vegas. When I got out of the tour bus, I went to get into a personal vehicle and there was a drive-by that occurred and they shot me three times. And again, I felt a sense of purpose. And then again, it was stripped from me. It was taken in one night. So I reverted back to that
old way that I had from a kid. The power, the respect. So, the neighborhood that I was in, everybody was close-knit.
Everybody knew everybody. We knew the vehicles that
were coming in and out. We knew the vehicles that
were supposed to be there, that weren't supposed to be there. So it was very secure for
me and very easy for me to get in and out or get
away when a cop is coming in. Denver is very known for drug abuse. Also homelessness. A lot of people nowadays
are using vehicles to get high and to supply a high. It's not money-induced, it's drug-induced. Homelessness is rough
when it becomes winter. Car theft goes up when it's winter because people have nowhere
to stay, nowhere to sleep. They're sleeping on the streets. So when you think about
car theft in the winter or in Denver, you also have
to think about survival. Because if you don't have
shelter, if you don't have money, a means of transportation,
you don't have anything. You might even die out there. And homelessness has went
up significantly in Denver, especially downtown Denver. In the particular instance
that I pulled a gun on the cop, I was driving down the street and I noticed a vehicle following me. I made an illegal left-hand turn. I made my first right and
I turned around right away. The first vehicle that
came down that street was the vehicle that I'd seen tailing me. So at that point, I jumped out and I was, like, throwing my hands up. You know, "What's going on? What's up?" When I reached out and pulled my gun out, I realized that it was an
unmarked police officer that was in a pickup truck. When he reached for his radio is when I knew that it was a cop. That's when I took off. The day that I was arrested, I had a friend in a stolen vehicle, the 2002 Dodge Ram Cummins diesel. Pretty fast truck. Had the truck probably three, four months. During that time, I was involved in a lot
of high-speed chases. I was going northbound on a street in Denver called Sheridan. I started seeing two vehicles swerving in and out of lanes following me. So just to make it clear, I made a right and then I pulled down
an alley, made a left. Look over at my friend, and they were like, "What are you doing?" Said, "I'm being followed." "You're tripping. You're
just high or something." And I feel like, I'm like, you know what? Maybe I am just tripping. So I turned around and I ended
up going to a storage unit. As I'm sitting there waiting, I put my feet up on the doorjamb, put my hands behind my
head, and lay my head back. I maybe fell asleep
for, like, two minutes, two to five minutes. And then I woke up and I
was completely surrounded. I was hit from the front
and back by police officers. To me, it felt like an army. There was police officers everywhere. They had their guns drawn on me. They took me to the station, and they asked me, "Where'd
you get the vehicle?" And I lied, "Oh, I got
it from this person. I borrowed it from that person." They knew it was BS. And they knew that they were going to get a conviction off of me. From there, they took me to jail. I have felonies for aggravated
motor vehicle theft, and I also have a felony
for vehicular eluding, which is running from the
police in a stolen vehicle. I was able to help the veterans unit begin being started in
Jefferson County jail. I feel being a veteran is what saved me from everything. It wasn't just ran by regular deputies. It was also ran by veteran deputies. No one will ever know the
bond that a veteran has, even if they've never met. We did different programs. We did healthy relationships, different kind of counseling, better parenting,
recovery, stuff like that. During that time, I set it up to where I met with the auto theft team, and I pretty much told them
how I stole the vehicles, what vehicles I stole. Kind of, I guess in a sense, giving back a portion of what I've taken. Because ultimately my main goal is to get the word out to the public that you can protect
yourself and your belongings. But I can be here to help
educate you in doing so. I got a 12- to 18-year deferred sentence as long as I was able to accomplish Veterans Treatment Court, which is intense, supervised probation. It's for two years. Different
phases. It's four phases. If I was not able to
complete that successfully, they would dismiss the suspension of that and then send me to DOC
for the remaining time. During my time in Veteran Treatment Court, I was placed into Harbor
Lights rehab facility. If I wasn't a veteran
getting released from jail, I would've had to go
back to a neighborhood. The VA is the one that I leaned on to pay for the rehab facility, versus other people were
relying on insurances. I had to take different courses as far as toxic masculinity, something that I was
very aware of that I had. You know, being this big, bad, macho man, gangster from the streets. Especially a man that has had no to little guidance in life. I cut ties pretty much
with all my family members, so I had no support other than
the people that I was around. With the VA, they gave me that. So if I wasn't a veteran, I'd probably be dead
or in jail to this day. The things that make a car or a vehicle more attractive to steal, for one, is security. If there's no anti-theft device, as far as, like, a car alarm. If you have bags or personal belongings in plain sight, that's another reason to steal it. If you upgrade your vehicle
with rims or sound systems and your car's flashy, it's
reasons to steal that vehicle. My advice for drivers, for one, don't be complacent. Put personal belongings away. Don't carry unnecessary things
with you in your vehicle. No. 2, install car alarms, different devices like that. Anything that's remote or ran on Bluetooth can be tapped into and stolen. The only real way to prevent
a car from being stolen is to break a circuit
somewhere within the car from the battery to the starter,
battery to the ignition. I would always suggest breaking passage between starter and battery. The only way to do that is
to manually put a switch in that'll break that circuit. That switch has to be manually
flipped for it to start. If a car thief gets in a
car and the car don't start, they're not going to spend time trying to figure out what's wrong with it. Yes, they may make entry, but they won't drive off in your vehicle. I think about a vehicle as a starting point to other thefts. If I see that you have a
garage-door opener on your car, say it's in a parking
garage, I steal the car. Most of the time people get so complacent, they might open their
mail inside their vehicle. Your address is on your mail. I'm going to take your vehicle with your garage-door
opener to your house. You're giving me full
access to your house, knowing I just took your car
from an underground garage at a different location. A keyless car theft is based on plugging a computer program pretty much where you
would check your codes for your engine failure
or things like that. Once you access the vehicle, then you can plug that device in and create a new key. People think that because
you have a key fob that they're safe, but
they're actually not. They're called relay thefts. What they're doing is
using a repeat amplifier to capture the signal from
the key fob to the car, so they're able to open the
doors and start the vehicle. They're able to get it to
wherever they need to go to then recreate and rechip a key chip for themselves. Catalytic converter theft is on the rise. Catalytic converters contain
palladium and platinum, which is two high precious metals that are highly sought
after at this point in time. Vehicles that are sitting higher are more prone to be targeted because they're easily accessed
with a higher clearance. The bigger the catalytic converter, the more expensive the
catalytic converter becomes. Catalytic converters are not something that I was ever involved in, for the fact that it was an easy $200, but I can get more for the whole vehicle than I can for a catalytic converter. I feel that auto theft has a big impact on the car market. For one, insurance rates
are going up because of it. So again, it's a way
to punish, in a sense, the vehicle owner. If Kias are going up in auto theft, why are they selling these vehicles and then turning around and
allowing car-insurance places to up their prices on the
person that's buying them? After the court process, the proceedings, things like that, I got married, had kids. I coach 10U AU softball. I have a full-time job. I'm a foreman. I go to work, come home with my family. I don't worry about
where I'm going to sleep or where my next meal's
going to come from, you know? So my life now is the American dream life.
