When Odometer Takes a Spin, Consumer Is Taken for a Ride : Fraud: County consumers lose $500,000 a year to car dealers who illegally turn back the numbers, says the DMV.

Kamran Afrafiabi specialized in buying high-mileage used cars at cut-rate prices at auctions. He would then return to his Anaheim car dealership and advertise the cars in newspapers and auto trade publications.

The only problem, state authorities say, is that Afrafiabi was rolling back the odometers. Cars with 80,000 miles or more on them had odometer readings of about 30,000. Buyers would pay up to $2,000 too much for cars that were on their last legs.

Acting on a tip from a disgruntled customer who bought a car from Afrafiabi, the state Department of Motor Vehicle began investigating the Anaheim car dealer. That investigation led to his arrest on April 9.

Afrafiabi, 28, of Laguna Niguel, Tuesday pleaded not guilty to 12 counts of grand theft. A pretrial hearing in North Orange Municipal Court in Fullerton has been set for June 13.

Afrafiabi and his attorney, John D. Barnett, both declined comment.

In the past year, a dozen odometer fraud scams have been uncovered in Orange County. Dozens more go undetected, DMV investigators say, adding that there has been an upswing in odometer tampering in recent years.

“People are realizing that there’s a lot of money to be made,” said Rande King, senior special investigator with the DMV. “Mileage is the biggest factor in value.”

According to the DMV, Orange County car buyers lose more than $500,000 a year due to odometer tampering. The $500,000 figure, investigators said, is an estimate based on Orange County automobile registrations and car sales.

It is estimated that odometer fraud costs consumers $8 billion a year nationwide.

Al Caruso, an area commander for the DMV’s investigative office in Irvine, says that illegal odometer tampering operations form “a pretty tight network, almost like selling drugs. There’s a market out there for good used cars. Most of the cars (whose odometers) are spun these days are former lease vehicles, where they have really put on a lot of miles.”

Caruso said odometer fraud is high on the list of priorities for the DMV’s investigation unit. There are 31 districts statewide that handle odometer fraud.

To help control odometer fraud, the DMV last year began a program of random highway checks of tractor-trailers transporting cars from out of state.

DMV investigators record the vehicle’s identification number and mileage at the check points. They record the ID number in a computer, then track the vehicle to see to which dealer it was sent and to whom it was sold.

“If there is any tampering with the odometers, we’re able to retrace the correct mileage and check with the new owner of the cars,” Caruso said. “We’re trying to make it very clear to the auto industry outside of California that we will not tolerate odometer spinning.”

The DMV has identified more than 300 odometer tampering cases within the past year in California.

About two years ago, the federal law was changed to make odometer tampering a felony offense instead of only a misdemeanor.

Since most dealers don’t provide records of previous owners, there are few easy ways for customers to know that they have purchased a car with an altered odometer reading. Most don’t find out until the engine gives out or other breakdowns occur, said King of the DMV.

Car dealers say that odometer tampering is a big problem and that they are particularly wary of vehicles received from out of state.

“If a dealer is suspicious, he can check things out for himself. He can call the owner and ask what the odometer read,” King said. If the readings don’t match up, he suggests that the dealer contact the DMV.

“It’s pretty tough to identify if an odometer had been rolled back,” said Jim Upp, executive director of the Motor Car Dealers Assn. of Orange County.

“Unless the guy was dumb enough to leave old stickers from an oil change or something that (indicates) the mileage, it’s hard for dealers to detect it,” Upp said.