Spate of Coordinated, High-Value Cargo Thefts Targets Tesla’s Nevada Gigafactory

Since last December, at least 11 separate heists have seen tractor-trailers loaded with Tesla electric vehicle and residential home batteries — valued at a combined millions of dollars — lifted directly from loading docks at the automaker’s massive Nevada campus, according to Storey County sheriff records obtained exclusively by WIRED.

“It’s an epidemic right now,” says Storey County Sheriff’s Detective Sam Hatley, lead investigator on the Tesla theft series. Three men linked to one of the robberies were taken into custody in January and charged with felony possession of stolen property, but the wider string of cargo thefts plaguing Elon Musk’s carmaker remains an active, previously unreported investigation. Hatley notes the 11 documented Tesla incidents in public sheriff records only scratch the surface of the full problem: his team is tracking a total of 17 alleged cargo theft incidents across Storey County this year, targeting both Tesla and other local businesses, though he declined to specify the exact number of additional thefts tied to the automaker. At least one theft ring that targeted Tesla also hit nearby battery recycling firm Redwood Materials, he adds. Official counts almost certainly understate the full scale of the issue, Hatley explains, as many companies are hesitant to publicly disclose that their inventory has been stolen for fear of reputational or operational fallout.

Last year, transportation industry researchers calculated that U.S. cargo thefts roughly doubled between 2022 and 2024, costing American businesses a collective $18 million per day — a cost that almost invariably gets passed along to consumers in the form of higher retail prices. Per theft prevention consultancy Verisk CargoNet, high-value electronic components like semiconductors and battery packs have been among the most frequently targeted goods in recent years. What alarms both law enforcement and logistics operators most, however, is the sharp rise of so-called "strategic theft" operations — exactly the type of attacks Tesla appears to have fallen victim to. Unlike opportunistic cargo thefts, where thieves break into unattended trailers parked at highway rest stops, these coordinated rings actively exploit security gaps at major corporate facilities, using forged identification and pre-existing loose working relationships between automakers and contracted third-party truckers to walk straight onto property and drive off with high-value inventory.

The Gigafactory Security Overhaul

WIRED uncovered the series of thefts via public records requests for Storey County emergency dispatch logs, where Tesla’s sprawling 5.4 million square foot Gigafactory — run in a partnership with Panasonic, and the region’s single largest employer with an estimated 12,000 on-site staff — accounts for roughly 2% of all emergency calls made to the county last year, a large share of which are accidental pocket dials to 911.

Per sheriff reports, a Tesla associate manager told investigators that the earliest string of thefts was made possible by the company’s failure to enforce basic, baseline security protocols. Since the heists began, however, Tesla has rolled out tightened operational rules, most notably mandatory driver identity verification checks at every factory entry gate.

“It’s definitely helping,” Hatley confirms. “Thefts are still happening, but they’re far less frequent and far less widespread.”

Requests for comment sent to Tesla, the named associate manager in the incident reports, and Redwood Materials all went unanswered.

A String of High-Stakes Battery Heists

The first recorded incident in the current theft wave dates back to December 2023, when a disreputable logistics carrier drove off with two separate trailers loaded full of Powerwall 3 residential battery systems, each haul holding more than $475,000 worth of product directly from Tesla property. Authorities located both empty trailers roughly 500 miles away in Southern California, and Tesla’s internal security team later spotted some of the stolen Powerwalls listed for sale online and alerted law enforcement. Investigators note that stolen Tesla batteries cannot be activated once flagged in the company’s system, so reselling them to end users provides very little tangible financial gain for thieves.

A separate incident that same month saw a Northern California auto parts dealer reach out to Tesla and local law enforcement to report an attempted discounted sale of unlabeled EV batteries, which investigators later confirmed were part of the stolen Tesla inventory. Tesla reported one additional theft in December, followed by nine more in January. That wave of January heists included a January 19 incident where a trailer loaded with 123 Powerwall units, bound for Tesla’s Hayward, California facility, never reached its destination. Sheriff’s records show that the semi-truck used to pick up the trailer, and the logistics company its driver was employed by, lacked valid licensing to conduct interstate freight operations. A third-party freight broker had incorrectly awarded the transport contract to the unvetted, illegitimate carrier.

Two more trailers, each holding roughly $500,000 worth of Powerwalls, were stolen over the four days that followed. Investigators tracked both via their built-in GPS history: one was recovered completely empty, while the other was found fully loaded at a gas station just 18 miles outside the Gigafactory. Detectives placed an additional hidden GPS tracker on the full trailer, planning to stake out the location and arrest any thieves who returned to retrieve it, and notified Tesla’s security team of their plan. The plan fell apart, however, when Tesla employees arrived unannounced to recover the trailer themselves, leading confused local deputies to briefly pull over the Tesla staff on scene. Hatley declined to comment on the miscommunication mishap.

The following week, two more trailers were stolen — but unlike previous heists, thieves did not disable or discard their built-in GPS trackers, and both were quickly located parked nearby with their full cargo loads untouched. Tesla recovered one of the two, while deputies placed their own covert GPS tracker on the second. On January 30, the tracker on that second trailer began moving, and officers intercepted the vehicle and arrested three suspects driving away with the full load. Prosecutors allege the three men, all in their 20s — Arashdeep Singh, Deepindeer Singh, and Harman Pal Singh — drove north from California using forged commercial driver’s licenses registered to other people’s names. Their cases are currently scheduled to go to trial in October. Attorneys listed as representing two of the three defendants in court filings did not respond to WIRED’s requests for comment.

Industry and Legislative Crackdowns

Companies and federal lawmakers are already rolling out new policy and technical measures to push back against the rising cargo theft trend. Amazon announced last month that it has deployed new safeguards including AI-powered anomaly detection for freight routes and daily third-party carrier screening to protect its shipment network. Around the same time, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bipartisan bill designed to streamline prosecution for both organized retail and cargo theft, and improve cross-jurisdictional coordination between different law enforcement agencies. The bill is currently pending review in the U.S. Senate.

“Highly organized, large-scale retail and cargo theft operations have been growing steadily, and we need far more coordinated action to crack down on these rings,” Nevada Senator Catherine Cortez Masto, who has pledged to push for the bill’s passage in the Senate, told WIRED. “These crimes create massive operational chaos for local businesses, and ultimately drive up costs for hardworking American families.” Masto declined to comment on whether she has directly coordinated with Tesla to address its specific theft issues.

For his part, Hatley praised Tesla’s current level of cooperation with his department, a marked shift from 2018, when local media reported Tesla refused to assist the Storey County sheriff’s office with an investigation into suspected copper wire theft at the Gigafactory. “To get ahead of this theft epidemic, it’s going to take coordinated, aligned effort from carriers, freight brokers, the companies targeted by thefts, and law enforcement working as a team,” he noted.

Additional reporting by Aarian Marshall.