Thieves steal $963,000 of graded Pokémon and sports cards from FedEx truck outside PSA in Santa Ana

Thieves stole an estimated $963,000 of trading cards from a FedEx truck parked outside Professional Sports Authenticator’s (PSA) Santa Ana headquarters on 13 October, police have said.

It was parked outside PSA’s grading facility at 1610 E. St. Andrew Place, home to Collectors, the firm behind the PSA brand, USA Today reported. Santa Ana Police Department spokesperson Natalie Garcia said two pallets — roughly 100 packages each — were stolen and a third pallet of about 50 packages was disturbed. The driver had been away 60 to 90 minutes and the lock was broken, police said. The graded sports and Pokémon cards were en route back to their owners. As of 20 October, there were no arrests and nothing had been recovered.

Collectors, PSA’s parent company, said it had “deactivated the certificates for the stolen cards and notified marketplace partners so they can be on the lookout for rare and serialized items”, contacted affected customers directly, and was arranging compensation based on fair market value. FedEx said it was working with law enforcement and that “the security of our customers’ shipments is a top priority”.

Victims are counting their losses online. Collector Nick Andrews — Boston Card Hunter on social media — claimed to have compiled a list of 383 cards believed stolen, including a 1995 Upper Deck 23K Gold Michael Jordan. Trader Sky-B Cards said he lost 104 cards collected over two years, paid $8,468 in grading fees, and was “absolutely financially destroyed”.