Pieces Fall Together for Police in ‘Chop Shop’ Raid : Crime: Officers find a Ferrari worth $250,000, and sheds filled with parts apparently from stolen cars.

Sometimes the best police tool is pure luck.

A two-hour sequence of lucky breaks helped officers on routine patrol bust a Reseda “chop shop” specializing in stolen Ferraris and Porsches, Los Angeles police said Saturday.

Officers discovered eight cars, including a 1990 Ferrari worth an estimated $250,000, as well as two sheds filed with parts apparently from stolen sports cars.

“It was just a series of lucky coincidences and quick thinking by patrol officers,” Detective Gerry Good said. “Sometimes everything falls together for us.”

It all started about 10:30 p.m Friday when two officers answering a routine call found a Ferrari engine apparently discarded by the side of the road in Reseda, Good said.

“The Ferrari engine was just sitting there,” said Good, who would not give the exact location or release the names of the two officers.

“The next call they receive is from a citizen who reports that there is a suspicious operation nearby,” Good said.

The caller, a neighbor, said she suspected it was a chop shop because she had seen several cars going in, but few coming out. She added that three young men had just left the house driving a U-Haul truck after loading what appeared to be a car engine.

The officers took her report and noted the address of the house--in the 17000 block of Hart Street--where the suspicious activity occurred, Good said. But they still had no proof that a crime had occurred there.

A few blocks away, at Sherman Way and Yarmouth Avenue, the officers noticed a U-Haul truck with three young men in the front cab, Good said. They pulled it over, interviewed the men and searched the truck, finding engine grease--but no engine--in the truck bed. The men denied any connection with Hart Street.

The officers took the men in for further questioning and then went to the Hart Street house and knocked on the door. The man who answered denied knowledge of any illegal activity but said his three roommates--the same trio who were in police custody--frequently worked on cars behind the house. He offered to let the officers see the garage, Good said.

“He showed them around,” Good said. In the driveway and garage behind the house, “they saw some cars in various stages of dismantling.”

A routine check showed the cars were stolen and all four men, whose names were not released, were arrested, Good said. The investigation is continuing and more arrests are possible, he added.

Detectives remained at the scene Saturday morning sorting through two sheds behind the house that were filled with scores of auto parts, including doors, windows and miscellaneous items, Good said. Most of the parts came from upscale sports cars.

“We haven’t inventoried all we have yet,” Good said. “Some of the parts here have been reported stolen for more than a year.”

Good said the four men, who were being held at West Valley Jail in lieu of $110,000 bail each, were probably part of a larger car theft ring.

“These guys didn’t start out on Ferraris and Porches,” Good said. “This is part of something bigger.”