CONNECTICUT (WTNH) — Connecticut officials and officials from 35 other states have agreed to a settlement with automakers Hyundai and Kia to come up with a plan to help prevent vehicles from being stolen. 

Connecticut Attorney General William Tong (D) and 35 other states call the settlement, which has been several years in the making, a matter of public safety. The issue concerns the number of Hyundai and Kia vehicles that have been reported stolen and crashes related to these thefts.

The settlement provides up to $4.5 million in restitution for customers whose cars had been stolen.

“This settlement points us back in the right direction to help address some of the underlining issues that have made it easier to steal vehicles,” Meriden Police Chief Roberto Rosado said.

Tong said that groups of young people known as “Kia Boys” were aware that Kia and Hyundai vehicles did not possess modern anti-theft technology, making those brands of vehicles more vulnerable to theft.

One such example is a 2023 incident in which a group of teens reportedly stole and crashed a Hyundai in Waterbury, resulting in the death of a 14-year-old girl. 

“Connecticut State Police have been saying for some time that they needed some assistance, that they needed help in reducing the opportunity for these vehicles to be stolen,” Connecticut Department of Emergency Services Commissioner Ronnell Higgins said.

Several states have attempted to get Hyundai and Kia to alter the way their vehicles are built in the United States, finally coming to an agreement with the two automakers to provide an anti-theft device to protect the vehicles. 

“At some point, they started offering excuses,” Tong said. “You can do just a software update, that will fix it. That didn’t work. We advocated for a recall, they refused. This settlement requires that, for all future vehicles sold in the United States, Hyundai and Kia will install, as part of their standard package, industry engine immobilizer anti-theft technology.”

The technology is linked to the key fob, which means that the car will not start if the smart key is not present.

Connecticut is requiring Kia and Hyundai to provide customers with a free zinc-reinforced engine cylinder protector for vehicles already on the road that are not equipped with the anti-theft technology.

Nuno F.G. Loureiro, a 47-year-old physicist and fusion scientist, was shot Monday night at his home in Brookline, Massachusetts. He died at a local hospital on Tuesday, the Norfolk District Attorney’s Office said in a statement.

The prosecutor’s office said no suspects had been taken into custody as of Tuesday afternoon, and that its investigation was ongoing.

Loureiro, who joined MIT in 2016, was named last year to lead MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center, where he aimed to advance clean energy technology and other research. The center, one of the school’s largest labs, had more than 250 people working across seven buildings when he took the helm.

Loureiro, who was married, grew up in Viseu, in central Portugal, and studied in Lisbon before earning a doctorate in London, according to MIT. He was a researcher at an institute for nuclear fusion in Lisbon before joining MIT, it said.

“He shone a bright light as a mentor, friend, teacher, colleague and leader, and was universally admired for his articulate, compassionate manner,” Dennis Whyte, an engineering professor who previously led MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center, told a campus publication.

The president of MIT, Sally Kornbluth, said in a statement that Loureiro’s death was a “shocking loss.”

The homicide investigation in Brookline comes as police in Providence, Rhode Island, about 50 miles away, continue to search for the gunman who killed two students and injured nine others at Brown University on Saturday. The FBI on Tuesday said it knew of no connection between the crimes.

A 22-year-old student at Boston University who lives near Loureiro’s apartment in Brookline told The Boston Globe she heard three loud noises Monday evening and feared it was gunfire. “I had never heard anything so loud, so I assumed they were gunshots,” Liv Schachner was quoted as saying. “It’s difficult to grasp. It just seems like it keeps happening.”

Some of Loureiro’s students visited his home, an apartment in a three-story brick building, Tuesday afternoon to pay their respects, the Globe reported.

The U.S. ambassador to Portugal, John J. Arrigo, expressed his condolences in an online post that honored Loureiro for his leadership and contributions to science.

“It’s not hyperbole to say MIT is where you go to find solutions to humanity’s biggest problems,” Loureiro said when he was named to lead the plasma science lab last year. “Fusion energy will change the course of human history.”