New Maine Law Will Make It Wicked Hard to Steal Catalytic Converters

Did you know that rusty thing under your car is quite valuable?

It's true. There's a reason thieve are willing to crawl under a car and steal the catalytic converter. Seriously, for a while, it seemed like if a vehicle stopped moving for like... two minutes, there was someone underneath it trying to cut it out. What you may not know, is that the converter is chock full of precious metals. Most of which I can't even pronounce. But a single one could be worth hundreds of dollars.

Just in the Bangor area, there have been dozens of people caught stealing them. And that's just the ones who were caught. There are probably plenty more who got away with it and were never caught. There are regulations in place to try and mitigate the number of thefts, but it doesn't seem to have helped much.

Going forward, catalytic converters will need background info.

New and used car dealers will now be required to engrave the full VIN of vehicles on the converter unless the car was sold at wholesale, or the converter is stuck in an inaccessible area on the car. Recycling places aren't exempt either. They'll be required to mark it with the VIN or the recycler’s license number and stock number.

Even if you remove your own, you'll still need to provide some markings, according to WGME. If it's out to be repaired, you don't have to do anything, but otherwise, it'll need some of your info. Basically, going forward, if a catalytic converter is removed, the state will need some kind of documentation. Even if it's damaged.

The law goes into effect on August 8th. No word on what the penalties will be for violating these terms going forward.

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