Heather Wright/The Independent

Officials from the ministry overseeing ServiceOntario says it has “rigorous” auditing processes, but won’t say if an internal investigation is underway to figure out how ownerships of classic cars were changed.

Four people now face charges after Watford car dealer Larry Grogan went to police saying over 200 classic cars had been stolen. Police allege four people “fraudulently obtained replacement ownerships” for the vehicles and resold them, according to the OPP. Police also charged the four with “forging documents to wit third party authorization forms as if it were genuine.”

Praveen Senthinathan of the Ministry of Public and Business Service Delivery said in a statement to The Independent, “the ministry takes the identification and prevention of fraud extremely seriously. However, we cannot speak further to the specifics of cases that are under an active investigation.”

Senthinathan says people working at ServiceOntario go through a “series of checks including a security screening” to ensure they don’t have a criminal record.

And he says it has “rigorous quality assurance and auditing policies and processes to review the accuracy of transactions and to maintain program integrity.

“Transaction data is regularly monitored to ensure that anomalies identified in the system are flagged, reviewed and investigated for subsequent action where appropriate. Any employee found to be engaging in unethical or illegal activity has all system privileges revoked immediately and law enforcement is engaged, where appropriate,” says Senthinathan.

People must go to a ServiceOntario location to change ownership and anyone using a third-party authorization has to provide photo identification.

The ministry, he says continues to work with police on the investigation.