Has anyone had their car stolen?

[rjfp1962]

(Sorry if their is a thread already on here for this subject)

I had my Skoda Fabia vRS stolen in early 2011. It was a very frosty day, started it to defrost it, and in the time it took me to grab the spare key to lock it, it was gone. Later I found out that about 6 cars had been targeted at the same time and were to have been used in an armed robbery. Obviously my own fault, but apparently a number of guys had been checking the area for a couple of days... seeking people just like me! I got it back after a couple of weeks, plates had been changed, vRS badges taken off, but undamaged. Had my local VAG independent in Milton Keynes check it out and put on new set of locks, and I replaced the badges and plates. The problem was I never felt happy with the car again and for me the whole theft thing was quite surreal. Upshot was, it was sold to someone who didn't mind what had happened with it, and he got a pretty good deal on a 2 owner very low mileage vRS. I had bought a Saxo VTS as an interim before getting a Clio 182..!

Edited by rjfp1962 on Friday 13th November 12:10

[Heaveho]

When I worked for Ford and XR3Is were all the rage ( I know ! ), hanging on to them was an utter headache, They came in the middle of the night with a truck to steal mine, as it turned out for the same reason as they wanted yours. The car had 2 alarms on it, they set them off, and gave up on the car in the middle of loading it, dumping it in the street with minimal damage, but I was up and out of the house by then.

Long story short, I caught up with one of them, and he threatened me with a hammer. I ended up getting it off him and battering him to the point where he went to hospital. The police turned up, saw my injuries and accepted that it was self defence. I should have left it there, but the knobheads he was in with came to the house when the girl I was living with at the time was in on her own and scared the crap out of her.

I wouldn't listen to reason, and in a blind rage I foolishly ( with the benefit of hindsight ) visited him while he was still in hospital, told him I was going do the same again to him when he got out, and I ended up under arrest and charged. I was ok with it all at the time ( early 20s ), but I look back on it now and wonder what the hell I was thinking.

I had a very difficult time for a few months afterwards, his crowd were threatening to shoot me and torch the car, my other half had to go back to her parents for a while, and I couldn't have the car at home until the situation was resolved ( fortunately for me, they managed to upset a local lunatic I vaguely knew who put a stop to them overnight ).

I had to go to court, but I hate thieves, and at the time it happened, my actions were completely temper driven, and as far as I was concerned, completely justifiable. My argument being I would never have met these bds if they hadn't come to steal my stuff.

" Cool story bro ", etc, etc, but it was one of the most difficult times of my life, up there with divorce and relocating to the other end of the country, both of which I did a few years later, although I'm now recently back in the city that all happened in. It's a lot more civilised here now!

You'll be relieved to know I'm also a bit calmer now!

Edited by Heaveho on Friday 13th November 01:07

Edited by Heaveho on Friday 13th November 01:32

[underwhelmist]

Heaveho said:

" Cool story bro ", etc, etc,

This, though, actually *is* a cool story. I love to hear about thieves, especially vehicle thieves, getting some sudden physical retribution. I've had a couple of motorbikes stolen years ago. Flogging is too good for them.

In all other respects I'm a wishy-washy vaguely lefty Guardian Reader type, but when it comes to vehicle theft, bring back the stocks!

[b80]

Heaveho said:

When I worked for Ford and XR3Is were all the rage ( I know ! ), hanging on to them was an utter headache, They came in the middle of the night with a truck to steal mine, as it turned out for the same reason as they wanted yours. The car had 2 alarms on it, they set them off, and gave up on the car in the middle of loading it, dumping it in the street with minimal damage, but I was up and out of the house by then.

Long story short, I caught up with one of them, and he threatened me with a hammer. I ended up getting it off him and battering him to the point where he went to hospital. The police turned up, saw my injuries and accepted that it was self defence. I should have left it there, but the knobheads he was in with came to the house when the girl I was living with at the time was in on her own and scared the crap out of her.

I wouldn't listen to reason, and in a blind rage I foolishly ( with the benefit of hindsight ) visited him while he was still in hospital, told him I was going do the same again to him when he got out, and I ended up under arrest and charged. I was ok with it all at the time ( early 20s ), but I look back on it now and wonder what the hell I was thinking.

I had a very difficult time for a few months afterwards, his crowd were threatening to shoot me and torch the car, my other half had to go back to her parents for a while, and I couldn't have the car at home until the situation was resolved ( fortunately for me, they managed to upset a local lunatic I vaguely knew who put a stop to them overnight ).

I had to go to court, but I hate thieves, and at the time it happened, my actions were completely temper driven, and as far as I was concerned, completely justifiable. My argument being I would never have met these bds if they hadn't come to steal my stuff.

" Cool story bro ", etc, etc, but it was one of the most difficult times of my life, up there with divorce and relocating to the other end of the country, both of which I did a few years later, although I'm now recently back in the city that all happened in. It's a lot more civilised here now!

You'll be relieved to know I'm also a bit calmer now!

Edited by Heaveho on Friday 13th November 01:07

Edited by Heaveho on Friday 13th November 01:32

That is a good story. In hindsight would you have confronted them like that again or just let them go with the car?

[alorotom]

My Q7 was stolen from outside the house about 3yrs ago now.

The keys were fished through the letterbox. I’m not sure how they knew the keys would be there in the stairs but I always kept / left them there.

By the time the tracker was activated it was gone. I don’t believe it’s ever resurfaced anywhere.

Insurance sorted it out very quickly in fairness. Police were mostly useless.

[bobbysmithy]

Heaveho said:

When I worked for Ford and XR3Is were all the rage ( I know ! ), hanging on to them was an utter headache, They came in the middle of the night with a truck to steal mine, as it turned out for the same reason as they wanted yours. The car had 2 alarms on it, they set them off, and gave up on the car in the middle of loading it, dumping it in the street with minimal damage, but I was up and out of the house by then.

Long story short, I caught up with one of them, and he threatened me with a hammer. I ended up getting it off him and battering him to the point where he went to hospital. The police turned up, saw my injuries and accepted that it was self defence. I should have left it there, but the knobheads he was in with came to the house when the girl I was living with at the time was in on her own and scared the crap out of her.

I wouldn't listen to reason, and in a blind rage I foolishly ( with the benefit of hindsight ) visited him while he was still in hospital, told him I was going do the same again to him when he got out, and I ended up under arrest and charged. I was ok with it all at the time ( early 20s ), but I look back on it now and wonder what the hell I was thinking.

I had a very difficult time for a few months afterwards, his crowd were threatening to shoot me and torch the car, my other half had to go back to her parents for a while, and I couldn't have the car at home until the situation was resolved ( fortunately for me, they managed to upset a local lunatic I vaguely knew who put a stop to them overnight ).

I had to go to court, but I hate thieves, and at the time it happened, my actions were completely temper driven, and as far as I was concerned, completely justifiable. My argument being I would never have met these bds if they hadn't come to steal my stuff.

" Cool story bro ", etc, etc, but it was one of the most difficult times of my life, up there with divorce and relocating to the other end of the country, both of which I did a few years later, although I'm now recently back in the city that all happened in. It's a lot more civilised here now!

You'll be relieved to know I'm also a bit calmer now!

Edited by Heaveho on Friday 13th November 01:07

Edited by Heaveho on Friday 13th November 01:32

CSB indeed. To risk your own life to go at someone with a hammer is madness but the subsequent follow up is insane. Most people wish they would do the same to these horrible bds so massive kudos to you. It's just a shame you didnt hammer them all so hard they couldn't come back for you. Utter scummy cretins.

Big hard men stealing peoples cars yet they cant accept that someone got the better of them yet they have probably caused so much pain and stress and probably injury for people, they cant accept it is a consequence of doing the crime. Amazing that criminals who would come to your house would phone the police for your hospital visit too. What did they do to your gf at the time and what happened with the local madman?

[Ashtray83]

In 2016 we had some visitors in the night came into the house took the keys for and proceeded to pinch my mrs car off the drive, my car from the Locked detached garage and my transit van from the space at the back of the house!
Didn’t hear a peep kind of glad we didn’t as what they did a few hrs later was reverse the van through a co-op shop front in an attempt to rob the cash point (dheads didn’t know the van was full up and abandoned it on the pavement!?). 2 days later my mrs Ford ka was used by the same people to carry out an robbery on a post office with a machete! All the while leaving a trail of evidence which led to their arrest! Never found my car but we still have the ka now it was returned to us complete with the tools they stole from the van still in the boot!
Seems they had made a career out of being the dumbest criminals on the planet with over 200 arrests and several prison visits on their record think they ended up with 5,7 and 9 years

[generationx]

Three times I've been victim of car crime (successful or attempted):

1. My Mk3 Escort XR3i was broken into outside my flat in delightful Basildon. For the previous couple of weeks the (aftermarket, insurance-required) alarm had been going off more and more frequently and, presuming it was a heavy-footed cat and due to the fact the car was parked behind my girlfriend's and directly outside the bedroom window, I left it switched off. Then one morning I came out to discover a broken window and a clinically-removed Kenwood system. The police couldn't give a toss. This was the straw that broke the camel's back with that POS unreliable heap, soon it was gone, replaced by a much newer Orion...

2. My Mk4 Orion Ghia was parked outside a mate's house for the night in downtown Bath while we went on the p1$$, secured carefully with one of those yellow things that attached to the gearknob and handbrake lever. We came back and the car was gone - sobered me up pretty quickly! After a few days it was recovered, minus two wheels, two headrests (!) and the whole Kenwood (again) system. Insurance only paid to put a standard Ford unit back which was a bit disappointing, but probably due to naivety on my part. The car never felt the same after that and was soon sold.

3. (And this is the most insulting) My Mk2 RS2000 got opened by some light-fingered fellow by shoving a screwdriver under the door handle lock, seemingly with no further damage. However this was not what alerted me to the crime. As I got in to the car on a dark winter's morning I didn't notice anything untoward until I started the car and went to turn the radio on, only to see it wasn't there. It was actually on the passenger seat - the thief had either been disturbed or didn't find the radio to his liking so had left it and moved on

I've owned several "target" cars in amongst these including several Ford RSs and the thief-favourite Golf R - none of these were ever touched...

[Louis Balfour]

rjfp1962 said:

(Sorry if their is a thread already on here for this subject)

I had my Skoda Fabia vRS stolen in early 2011. It was a very frosty day, started it to defrost it, and in the time it took me to grab the spare key to lock it, it was gone. Later I found out that about 6 cars had been targeted at the same time and were to have been used in an armed robbery. Obviously my own fault, but apparently a number of guys had been checking the area for a couple of days... seeking people just like me! I got it back after a couple of weeks, plates had been changed, vRS badges taken off, but undamaged. Had my mate who owns Unit 18 Automotive in Milton Keynes check it out and put on new set of locks, and I replaced the badges and plates. The problem was I never felt happy with the car again and for me the whole theft thing was quite surreal. Upshot was, it was sold to someone who didn't mind what had happened with it, and he got a pretty good deal on a 2 owner very low mileage vRS. I had bought a Saxo VTS as an interim before getting a Clio 182..!

Edited by rjfp1962 on Friday 13th November 00:50

Yup, had a Range Rover stolen at a time when lots of them were going missing. So many, in fact, that a plummy chap from Land Rover head office called me proactively to tell me that they didn't have a problem with security...at all...not even a little bit....a manufacturer's cars being stolen en masse was completely normal...

Anyway, the police found it and I got it back. I had it repaired and treated it to a top notch valet. I then forgot about it, because the thieves had probably driven it more carefully than I did and all traces of the rogues had been removed by cleaning.

Never underestimate the positive psychological impact of cleaning.

[Heaveho]

b80 said:

That is a good story. In hindsight would you have confronted them like that again or just let them go with the car?

I'd like to think even knowing what would happen, I'd try and stop them, but it's easy to say now. It was a long time ago, way before the victim was turned into the criminal, so in some respects there was less to think about other than my own safety, and again, in the heat of the moment, even that went out of the window. All this happened at the time when mortgage rates were at about 16%, we had just bought a house, and I was doing 2 jobs to keep it together, so just owning the car wasn't easy. Having someone try to nick it was never something I was just going to let happen back then.

For the poster who asked, my girlfriend at the time was very middle class ( not like me, semi house trained, look like an escaped mental patient! ), and stuff like this just wasn't on the radar for her. We stayed together for a long time afterwards, and got married in the end, but split up eventually. The local nutter who intervened on my behalf did so because all of this was happening a bit close to home for his liking and he didn't want attention drawn to his affairs. I never did find out what he actually did, but his words were basically " Bring the car back home on Friday. Leave it unlocked if you want, nobody's going to touch it, and tell your lass it's safe to come back ''!

He and I never spoke about it again and I never had any more problems in the 3 years or so I lived there afterwards.

It never crossed my mind I might be in trouble with the police, and although that did happen, it was basically a slap on the wrists. The recriminations from the people trying to take the car was the biggest issue, and of course, under those circumstances, they know where to find you..

I genuinely don't know what I would do now. I'm older and slower, so if I confronted them now in the same situation, Im fairly sure it would end badly for me. But I'm not sure I could live with myself if I just let them go without a fight. I hope I never have to find out.

Edited by Heaveho on Friday 13th November 08:02

[Ian Geary]

No, (but most of my car's have been pretty crap to be fair)

A mate at work had his defender stolen from his drive one night. They covered up security lights, broke in, released the handbrake and rolled it out of the drive to a field entrance opposite where they bypassed the alarm /immobiliser.

He never saw it again. This was only a couple of years ago

[outnumbered]

A previous house had no drive, parking was in a layby 100 yards up the road. One morning I came out and saw my Mk I Astra was the opposite way round to how I'd left it.

Yes, someone had nicked it and then BROUGHT IT BACK! It had done about 10 miles.

[anonymous-user]

Mid 70's I had a Cortina 1600E.

Got nicked twice in 2 weeks even though it had been secured with (at the time) an ultra modern crook lock. Both times police found it very quickly.

First time they caught 3 blokes in it near the Severn Bridge and the local police even gave me a lift down to fetch it when they went to bring them back to the local station. The police tended to be a bit more helpful in those days.

2nd time it was found in Blackpool.

I think it did more mileage without me than it did with me.

[Mark8815]

Not stolen, but attempted. Feb 2018 woke up in the middle of the night to a bang, shot downstairs to see all the kitchen cupboards and doors open, back door wide open (they had burned the lock off with some form of blowtorch) me running downstairs had obviously scared them off. We had a Focus RS and a Focus ST at them time. A few hours later we saw on Facebook that a stolen Golf R had crashed at high speed and the driver and passenger were in a critical condition,no idea whether it was the same lads or what happened to them.

[The Brummie]

Back in the early 80’s I had my company Vauxhall Astra stolen from a multi-storey in Birmingham.

It was found a few week later in an abandoned warehouse. On its roof. Just a bare shell. Anything that was saleable was gone.

There were five other Astra shells in the same warehouse so clearly someone had been busy.

[LordHaveMurci]

Had my Citroen BX GTi stolen overnight about 22yrs ago, I genuinely thought my mates had set me up for a prank TV show or similar & delayed calling the Old Bill - turns out they were useless anyway

Car stolen on Thursday night, was dumped in a layby a few miles away on the following Tuesday morning with some minor damage. I refused to have the car back in case it had been stolen for parts, insurers wrote it off after a bit of a battle.

Replaced it with an S13 200SX which I hated

[Jamescrs]

Had my Audi A4 S-line stolen from outside my house just about 2 years ago now. Just got back from a work trip to London. Parked and locked my car with my laptop etc still in the boot because it was late and went in to bed.
Woke up the following morning and opened curtains and no car outside
They snapped the locks on my back door came in the house grabbing my wallet, phone and car keys before letting themselves out of the front door with the keys and taking the car.

It turned up in a district of Bradford 5 days later they had taken a bend too fast and hit a kerb buckling the suspension there was blood in the car and it was on false plates and stunk of petrol, they must have tried to burn it out but for whatever reason didn't.

The car was written off due to the blood, someone was arrested and charged with handling stolen goods, never got my work stuff back i went to the recovery garage to meet Police CSI and point out what wasn't mine in the car, it was gutting to see it.

Pit me off buying a decent car for a while I beefed up my security and ran an old Volvo for a couple of years. Have a decent car again now but im really cautious about securing my house on a night

[NormalWisdom]

4 cars stolen over the years;

1. 1 - 1980 - Escort MkI 1300l swiped from Chatham St carpark in Reading whilst I was at work. Recovered intact with pair of bran new jeans still on the back seat!
2. 2 - 1992 - Fiesta XR2 swiped from a car park in a B&B in York (had £1300 worth of camera kit in it!!). Never recovered.
3. 3 - 1998 - Jag XJ6 swiped from station carpark at Wokingham - Got to see CCTV pics of the car leaving the carpark. Never recovered
4. 4 - 2005 - Mitsibushi VR4 pinched from a carpark in the centre of Winchcombe whilst having dinner. Found in a field having been ragged a lot, paid c£1.5k to have loom & ignition replaced and various items fixed.

Maybe I am just unlucky...........

[Pig benis]

I've never had a car stolen, but I've had a few bikes nicked over the years.

I honestly don't know how the average Joe handles situations like this, but for me it feels like a bomb goes off in my head, and I do fear that I may really hurt someone, or be seriously injured myself.

I used to suffer with anger issues in my youth, the slightest thing and I would go into a complete spiral. I've learnt to control that, but someone stealing from me brings it all back. Scares the st out of me tbh.

I'm rambling now

PB

[cedrichn]

Sad stories....

One question comes to me: do you use "manual" lock ? The type of things you put on the steering lock, or the gear lever, etc... I see "a lot" of modern cars - 911, Q7, Aston,.... - with them, and I am left to believe they are useless. If they want your car, they will... But I am interested to get your views, as you have sadly more experience than me... (as another poster, my cars are hopefully useless enough to be interesting only to myself )