These thieves must’ve been desperate…
We’ve seen plenty of examples of car dealerships being hit by car thieves in the past few years, but from time to time we see a rental lot get targeted. In what’s one of the more dramatic examples, a Hertz location in Gates, New York had a dozen vehicles swiped by thieves sometime in the night of December 11. At first, Hertz thought 17 cars were stolen, however after cross-referencing inventory with other locations that number was changed to 12.
Hertz settled a lawsuit over supposed car thefts. Learn more here.
Still, Gates Police Chief Robert Long said the heist was “definitely something out of a movie.” About five suspects broke into the secured lot by cutting through the chain link fence. Once inside, they boosted a Chevy Suburban, using it to push a box truck which was parked in front of the gate out of the way. Then they used the big SUV to push the gate open.
By the morning of December 12, police had recovered 6-8 of the stolen cars. According to Chief Long, those had been found parked in different locations. From what we know about car thief behavior in 2022, they were probably left in public areas to see if authorities found them using GPS trackers. Thieves often do this for a few days to keep police from finding their chop shop, etc.
Police don’t believe those recovered rental vehicles were used to commit any other crimes. They were found in good condition, adding fuel to the theory they were left to be recovered by the thieves later if police couldn’t track them.
No suspect descriptions are available, even though there’s surveillance footage of the theft. It sounds like the suspects covered their faces, however Chief Long believes the suspects are likely teenagers since they’re most commonly involved in car thefts thanks to New York’s Raise the Age law. We’ve seen car theft rings recruit minors to steal vehicles because of such laws.
Source: Rochester First
Image via Hertz
