SEATTLE, Wash. — Two men have been indicted on charges of importing and selling dozens of counterfeit Honda airbags in Whatcom County and British Columbia.
Abdul Masood Qayumi and Abdul Masih Qayumi are accused of importing the counterfeit airbags from a manufacturer in Guangzhou, China.
Homeland Security special agents discovered the brothers’ email communications using several different email accounts, calling for fake invoices, and telling customers the airbags were made by the original manufacturer.
“Once they enter the commerce, the people doing the trade don’t even know they’re counterfeit at that point,” said Brad Bench, special agent in charge at Homeland Security Investigations.
Homeland Security provided KIRO 7 with video shot by Honda, comparing a real airbag with one of the counterfeit ones allegedly sold by the suspects. The video has been entered as evidence in this case.
The fake airbag deploys and deflates much more quickly and even catches fire.
Bench said the market for counterfeit airbags has increased over the last five years.
“The more common something becomes in the marketplace, the more incentive there is for counterfeiters to copy the product,” he said.
Douglas Hansen, who owns Airbag Service, used to design airbags and now inspects cars.
Hansen has helped local law enforcement catch criminals who remove airbags or install fake ones. He said people making them have gotten much more sophisticated, but he can still tell the real from the counterfeit airbags.
“Somebody’s put a different random inflator inside the system, rebuilt it, because it’s cheaper, right? Then they have the wrong connectors,” Hansen said, showing one of the fake airbags he found in a used car.
He recommends anyone who has bought a used car to have it inspected at a dealer or licensed body shop.
Homeland Security agents also said that anyone who has had an airbag deployed, or who has a car older than five years, should go to www.safercar.gov for instructions on how to inspect the vehicle.
KIRO
