A young Montrealer accused of extortion and vehicle trafficking could pocket up to $15,000 per stolen vehicle.
This is what Yann Maever Soh Djomegne allegedly told an undercover agent he met in the cell after his arrest on November 2. According to information collected by the double agent, Soh Djomegne described himself as a car thief. He could pocket between $14,000 and $15,000 per vehicle and steal up to three in a single evening.
A few days before his arrest by the Montreal City Police Service (SPVM), he allegedly got his hands on a Corvette.
The keys to a Corvette similar to this one were found in a coat during the search targeting the suspect in Montreal. The car was later traced by the police.
Photo Adobe Stock
He was also suspected by police of car theft in Ontario. These details were revealed as part of the investigation into the accused’s release.
Since the start of the year, car theft has become a real scourge in Quebec with nearly 14,000 vehicles stolen from January to the end of November.
Weapon and cans of gasoline
The arrest of Soh Djomegne allows us to better understand what is happening on the ground. It all started last August, when the 22-year-old young man showed up at a store specializing in exports near the Montreal-Trudeau airport with three other people.
The quartet allegedly tried to force the company manager to export vehicles, otherwise he had to give them the sum of $30,000.
The manager had already refused a similar request a few days earlier, suspecting that the cars were stolen.
Faced with the refusal, Soh Djomegne went to the trunk of his car where he showed cans of gasoline. Another showed a weapon hidden in his pants.
They then threatened to set fire by stacking mattresses in the warehouse. Fortunately, the manager managed to call for help using his cell phone.
Yann Maever Soh Djomegne and three other accomplices allegedly tried to force a manager of this business located near Montreal-Trudeau airport to export vehicles last August.
Photo Pierre-Paul Poulin / Le Journal de Montréal
Arriving on the scene, the firefighters noticed the vehicle driven by Yann Maever Soh Djomegne leaving in a hurry.
$11,000 cash
With the physical description and the license plate number, the police began the investigation. Along the way, they saw the alleged thief frequenting two addresses in the metropolis, the one where he lived and another which would have served as his hideout.
While searching the premises, they discovered two Glock-type pistols made from a 3D printer. They also found tools for stealing cars, programmable blank keys and $11,000 in $100 bills.
The judge refused to release Yann Maever Soh Djomegne pending further proceedings, despite the commitments made by his mother. His lawyer, Me Camille Blanchette Sinotte, indicated that the testimony of the undercover agent will be the subject of questions later since it was not filmed and is based only on notes.
The young criminal will have to appear in court again in the coming weeks, notably for non-compliance with conditions.
During another arrest in June, he made a surprising revelation.
“He laughingly states that his career is to be a bandit and to give work to the police,” said the Crown prosecutor, reading the notes taken by a police officer.
Moreover, the young man was identified at the scene of a car theft with gunfire last September in Oka, according to a police report.
The three other individuals who were at the warehouse during the August extortion attempt have not been arrested because police say they have not been able to identify them.
GPS on Amazon
During the search carried out by the police in the apartment which would have served as a hiding place for the alleged thief, they discovered boxes from Amazon containing boxes of GPS devices. According to the Crown prosecutor, Me Marie-Christine Lajoie-Fillion, this type of device is commonly used to track stolen vehicles.
– With the collaboration of Ian Gemme
AND AT YOUR HOME ?
Is your municipality often the target of car thieves?
Find out on this map compiled by our Investigation Office, which allows you to locate down to the street, in certain cities, where thousands of vehicles have been stolen in Quebec since the start of the year.
Municipality (number of flights)
Number of flights to the same address
Methodology
This map of vehicle thefts in Quebec covers the year 2023, from January 1 to a date between June 30 and October 12, depending on the city.
The data comes from the Sûreté du Québec, the police service of the City of Montreal, the city of Laval, the city of Longueuil, the police service of the City of Gatineau, the police service of the city of Quebec , from the police service of the city of Lévis, from the police service of Sherbrooke, from the city of Blainville, from the police service of Châteauguay, from the police service from the city of Mascouche, from the city of Granby, from the city of Trois-Rivières, the police department of the city of Bromont, the police department of Lac des Deux-Montagnes, the police department of Memphrémagog, the police department of the city of Saint-Eustache, the police of Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, the city of Repentigny, the city of Mirabel, and Équité Association. Some were obtained through access to information.
Note that municipalities may have included vehicles such as motorcycles, trucks or boats in their balance sheet. As for location data, it was transmitted to us in different forms: postal code, street corner, street or neighborhood.
Data compilation: Nora T. Lamontagne and Philippe Langlois, Bureau of Investigation