News of the seminar soon spread to other law enforcement agencies who requested the opportunity to attend. The numbers of requests for attendance soon became too large for one agency to accommodate. Other law enforcement agencies agreed to host the annual seminars. From this group, the Midwest Auto Theft Association was organized. Shortly thereafter, a petition to the International Association of Auto Theft Investigators gave birth to the North Central Regional Chapter.

The excellence in training first offered by Robert Sattler provides the basis for the North Central Regional Chapter seminars and prompted the creation of this award to memorialize the dedication and commitment of Robert Sattler.

Nominees for this award must have performed an investigation in a superior manner and the results must have had a significant impact on auto theft and/or related crimes. Nominees may be from law enforcement, the insurance industry, the National Insurance Crime Bureau, vehicle manufacturers or others who have the common interests of the North Central Regional Chapter as their guiding principals and must be a member(s) in the Chapter. Nominees may be an individual or a unit.

This year it was awarded to Indiana State Police Detective Mitch Blocher and United States Secret Service Special Agent Danny DiRienzo for their investigation of a multi-state cloning and counterfeit title operation that resulted in over 60 stolen vehicles being recovered with a value in excess of 2.5 million dollars.

The case began in May of 2009 with Dennis Hoppes, an Indiana State DMV Investigator, who had accumulated approximately 60 North Carolina titles, which he suspected were counterfeit.  Investigator Hoppes contacted Detective Blocher who determined the titles were indeed counterfeit.  With the aid of Carfax, Detective Blocher was able to learn that all of the suspected VIN’s originated from Canada.

Detective Blocher had discovered each of these vehicles were currently also registered in several states were in fact “cloned” stolen vehicles using donor VIN’s from Canada.  Detective Blocher developed a list of several suspects and was able to gain the cooperation of one of the individuals.  As a result, several undercover operations were conducted with the assistance of Special Agent DiRienzo and the Indianapolis Field Office of the United States Secret Service.  These operations led to federal search warrants being issued and executed simultaneously in three states.  In all, six suspects were federally indicted.

Past recipients of the Bob Sattler award are:

Requests for consideration should be accompanied by supporting documentation and submitted no later than March 1 preceding the North Central Regional Chapter seminar.
Correspondence shall be directed to:

Requests for consideration should be accompanied by supporting documentation and submitted no later than March 1 preceding the North Central Regional Chapter seminar. Correspondence shall be directed to:

Oakland County Sheriff's Office
1201 North Telegraph
Pontiac, Michigan 48341
Attn: Sergeant Christopher Cole

Email: colec@oakgov.com