![]() The only two to walk away from the cataclysm unscathed, the hapless everyman known as the POSTAL Dude and his loyal companion Champ, drive aimlessly through the scorching deserts of Arizona looking for a new place to call home. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.Several years have passed since the events that devastated the once proud town remembered as Paradise. “We put boots on all the Hellcats.”Ĭopyright 2022 The Associated Press. “It’s a deterrent that works amazingly,” he said. ![]() Schneider said his dealership came up with an “old school” solution: parking boots. Even recovered vehicles can’t be sold for what they were once worth. “Once they get that money in their pockets they go out and steal another one.”įor dealerships and their insurance companies, the cost is high. “In the Detroit area they are selling them for like $3,500,” Hanna said. They were not believed to have stolen the vehicles, but to have paid $5,000 for one. A 2021 Dodge Durango GT, 2021 Dodge Ram TRX and a 2017 Dodge Charger Hellcat SRT were later recovered.Īuthorities arrested four people. The driver had crashed into a brick wall while fleeing. Police tracked one of the stolen cars, a Durango Hellcat SRT valued at about $100,000, to a suburb northwest of Detroit. “I think they were able to find some keys in a desk drawer and used them,” he added. ![]() Someone drove a Ram pickup through the building's glass wall and "all the other cars followed suit,” said Jeff Schneider, general manager at Szott Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram in Highland Township. Then last fall, a dealership's showroom northwest of Detroit was broken into. “They would call us and tell us `We have these cars missing.’”Ī spokeswoman for Stellantis declined to comment.Īdded security measures at some lots have included concrete barriers, according to law enforcement. “We started working with (Stellantis) in early 2022,” he said. Some also were destined for Memphis, Tennessee, Leist said. Investigators learned the vehicles mostly were being stolen in the Detroit area and taken to Cleveland. The sheriff’s office got calls about reckless driving, Capt. “Spike strips were eventually needed to remind Benjamin that the law required him to comply with police orders” the judge wrote.Ībout two years ago, police in Ohio’s Ottawa County began noticing the vehicles blasting along state Route 2. ![]() Videos posted on social media show how the high-horsepower vehicles outpaced and evaded police.Ī judge stated in a detention order that “Benjamin drove a 2022 Dodge Challenger valued at $95,000 at 120 mph down Ohio’s State Route 2 on a Sunday evening in February.” Harris said those thieves "were also selling to buyers in other areas, including Chicago and Indianapolis,” the complaint said. Harris told the FBI that he and Jones had been in contact through Instagram with people in the Detroit area to get stolen vehicles, according to the complaint. The AP left email and phone messages seeking comment from attorneys for Benjamin, Rice and Jones. Rice, Harris and Jones also are charged with mail theft. Jaylen Harris, Lavelle Jones and Hakim Benjamin are charged with conspiracy and interstate transport of stolen vehicles. Rice and others were indicted in federal court in Ohio in June. But court records show that a search of his car and then his home turned up not just stolen mail, bogus checks, and credit and debit cards, but also a Ram pickup, a Range Rover SUV and a Dodge with a Hellcat engine - all stolen. 31 after a postal worker in Shaker Heights, outside Cleveland, was robbed at gunpoint of a mailbox key. Thieves have targeted Dodges by using handheld electronic “pro pads” - a locksmith's tool that can clone keys by plugging into interior ports in the vehicles, according to the federal complaint in the Ohio case.Īuthorities weren’t looking for stolen vehicles when they stopped Devin Rice on Jan. More than a dozen Ford Mustangs were stolen in early September from the automaker's assembly plant in Flat Rock, southeast of Detroit. Just this year, about a half-dozen vehicles - primarily Dodge Ram TRX pickups - were taken from a lot outside an assembly plant in Macomb County.Īfter security measures were stepped up at some lots with Dodge vehicles, more than a dozen 2022 Ford F-150 Raptor pickup trucks were swiped from a plant lot in June in suburban Dearborn. Instead of stealing them off the street, they're driving them straight off dealership and assembly plant lots. “If a patrol car gets them, they are not stopping and they’re faster than patrol cars.
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