- Oct 28, 2001
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Back on August 15th, during that little blackout the northeast experienced, a dealer I know was broken into. Without any power, the alarm wasn’t working. The local police were patrolling his store, along with many other businesses. A squad car drove by at 12:30am, and everything was fine. The same squad car drove by again around 2:00am, and noticed a street bike sitting out in the parking lot next to the building. Upon further investigation, he discovered that the dealership had been broken into.
The thieving *******s first cut the chain link fence securing the outside storage area. The dealership has 2 fork lifts; an outside one and an inside one. Coincidently the key to the outside forklift was left in it’s ignition out in the storage area. The thieves then started the fork lift, put the forks under the large garage door leading into the building, and ripped it up completely in pieces and off the track. They then moved aside a bunch of $10-$15K street bikes, and focused just on the vehicles that did not have to be registered. They ended up stealing 9 vehicles – 6 dirt bikes and 3 watercraft, all 2003 or 2004 units. The value of the stolen units was around $50,000. They also attempted to steal the cash drawer, but just ended up destroying it instead. They also caused $3,000 in damage to the showroom trying to get at a quad up on a ramp display. All vehicles were built, so they must have had a fairly large truck to get them all out.
By all accounts this was not a random heist. They knew there was a fork-lift outside. The key wasn’t always left in it, but it was not uncommon either. When the blackout hit at 4:15pm, they evidently put a plan in place to steal the bikes, knowing that there wouldn’t be an alarm. They also knew where the cash drawer was located. Smells like an inside job, or at least someone with inside connections.
Fast-forward to today, somewhere in Redneck, Alabama…
A local drug dealer was spotted tooling around on a brand-new quad – kinda out of place for the slimball dealer and the part of town he was in. A neighbor was a little suspicious, so called the police. The local sheriff paid a visit to the guy on the quad, took down the VIN, and called the local Yamaha dealer with the VIN. Local dealer logs into Yamaha dealer web site, finds out vehicle was delivered to a dealer in Michigan. Sheriff calls dealer in Michigan and asks if he’s missing a vehicle. Once sheriff finds out that dealer is missing not 1, but 9 vehicles, he starts tracking down known associates of the drug dealer. Sure enough, the rest of the vehicles were found between 3 of the dealer’s friends.
So all vehicles were recovered, but the dealer is still out a few thousand dollars in deductible, getting the vehicles shipped back to Michigan, building damage, selling 9 used vehicles, etc. There’s also the chance that the dirtbags will only be charged with possession of stolen goods, not a $50,000 robbery!
Just goes to show you, it pays to be a good neighbor!
The thieving *******s first cut the chain link fence securing the outside storage area. The dealership has 2 fork lifts; an outside one and an inside one. Coincidently the key to the outside forklift was left in it’s ignition out in the storage area. The thieves then started the fork lift, put the forks under the large garage door leading into the building, and ripped it up completely in pieces and off the track. They then moved aside a bunch of $10-$15K street bikes, and focused just on the vehicles that did not have to be registered. They ended up stealing 9 vehicles – 6 dirt bikes and 3 watercraft, all 2003 or 2004 units. The value of the stolen units was around $50,000. They also attempted to steal the cash drawer, but just ended up destroying it instead. They also caused $3,000 in damage to the showroom trying to get at a quad up on a ramp display. All vehicles were built, so they must have had a fairly large truck to get them all out.
By all accounts this was not a random heist. They knew there was a fork-lift outside. The key wasn’t always left in it, but it was not uncommon either. When the blackout hit at 4:15pm, they evidently put a plan in place to steal the bikes, knowing that there wouldn’t be an alarm. They also knew where the cash drawer was located. Smells like an inside job, or at least someone with inside connections.
Fast-forward to today, somewhere in Redneck, Alabama…
A local drug dealer was spotted tooling around on a brand-new quad – kinda out of place for the slimball dealer and the part of town he was in. A neighbor was a little suspicious, so called the police. The local sheriff paid a visit to the guy on the quad, took down the VIN, and called the local Yamaha dealer with the VIN. Local dealer logs into Yamaha dealer web site, finds out vehicle was delivered to a dealer in Michigan. Sheriff calls dealer in Michigan and asks if he’s missing a vehicle. Once sheriff finds out that dealer is missing not 1, but 9 vehicles, he starts tracking down known associates of the drug dealer. Sure enough, the rest of the vehicles were found between 3 of the dealer’s friends.
So all vehicles were recovered, but the dealer is still out a few thousand dollars in deductible, getting the vehicles shipped back to Michigan, building damage, selling 9 used vehicles, etc. There’s also the chance that the dirtbags will only be charged with possession of stolen goods, not a $50,000 robbery!
Just goes to show you, it pays to be a good neighbor!
