A Kansas City man may have figured out the key to managing the law of supply and demand: control both sides of the equation. He is accused of selling cars to at least eight people on Facebook Marketplace, then stealing them after the transactions are complete, reports KCTV 5.
The Kansas City Police Department noticed a pattern in several auto thefts that took place between May and June 2025. In each case, the victims bought a vehicle from the same seller through Facebook Marketplace shortly before it was stolen. The seller’s account turned out to be fake, as well as the genuine-looking titles and bills of sale he provided. 106.3 The Groove says that only two cars were involved: a 2013 Buick Verano, which nobody misses, and a 2013 Honda Civic, a car with a history of thieves stealing it multiple times because they like it.
Police traced the sales and thefts back to Mamadou Diallo, who now faces eight counts of forgery and six counts of first-degree tampering with a motor vehicle, allegedly making more than $24,000 off his victims in the process. In 2025, Diallo was also charged with tampering with a motor vehicle, auto theft, and aggravated fleeing from police. If convicted on all counts, he could face up to 98 years in prison.
No take-backsies
Internet car scams are all too common. There are many ways to protect yourself from buying a stolen car, which might have helped these victims. Although it was too late to prevent her own theft, one of these victims figured out the scam after the fact when she found what she thought was the car she’d just bought and had stolen back up for sale on Facebook Marketplace. Taking a page out of the seller’s book, she also used a different account to contact him, acting like an innocent buyer rather than confronting him. The ruse worked, and the seller tried selling her the same car a second time. It’s probably better to pass the information to the police and let them scope out the situation, but I can’t argue with the results. She also had security camera footage of the theft just hours after the sale.
That’s the only problem with controlling both supply and demand in this way. It’s highly illegal. There’s also a significant digital “paper trail,” especially if using the same Facebook account to sell the cars each time. (Checking to make sure the seller’s account is, itself, legitimate is a good idea before even contacting them about your interest in a car.) In a day and age when even a lost license plate can take down a huge car theft ring, it’s just not worth trying to make a quick buck this way. Crime doesn’t pay.
