A group of thieves were caught on video, brazenly stealing two Mercedes from their owner’s driveway.
As you can see in footage posted by WPLG, the devilish duo arrived in a Mercedes GLA and decided to upgrade to an S-Class and GT 4-Door Coupe.
After backing up the GLA to the gate, the thieves exit and hop over. Unfortunately, the homeowner made life easy for the crooks as they left the keys inside the cars. Thanks to this boneheaded move, one thief moves the GLA while the other uses the GT 4-Door to smash through the gate, ripping it off its hinges as sparks fly. Besides the sleek hatchback, the pair also made off an S-Class.
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After fleeing the scene, the thieves disabled the factory GPS system to prevent authorities from tracking them. Thankfully, the owner had a secondary system installed which enabled him to remotely disable the vehicles and track them down. They’re now back in his possession, but both vehicles were damaged and the total bill is expected to be around $35,000 (£24,750 / €28,789) including the gates.
The owner wants the thieves brought to justice and is offering a $3,000 (£2,121 / €2,467) reward for information leading to their capture. Unfortunately, that could prove difficult as it doesn’t appear security cameras got a very good look at them.
Needless to say, the entire incident might have been avoided if the owner didn’t leave the keys in the vehicles. Last year, the National Insurance Crime Bureau noted 244,845 vehicles were stolen between 2017 and 2019 with keys inside them. However, the actual number is expected to be “substantially higher since many drivers don’t admit to making the mistake.”
While it’s hard to get an accurate picture on how often this occurs, the group noted thefts of vehicles with keys in them has been on the rise. There were 78,345 cases reported in 2017, and that number jumped to 82,369 in 2018 and 84,131 in 2019. Given that and common sense, lock your car and take your keys with you.