Car theft is never fun, but it hurts more when you lose a cherished enthusiast vehicle that’s close to your heart. That’s exactly what happened to TV presenter/currency arbitrage enthusiast Chris Harris this week. Thankfully, he was lucky enough that his fanbase was able to help him in his time of need.
When Harris’s first-generation BMW M5 was stolen, he took to Instagram on Monday to put out a call. “Stolen in Clifton, Bristol last night,” he posted. “Pls share and help me find it. Had it 19 years.”
With 900,000 Instagram followers, it didn’t take long for Harris to hear back. Just three hours later, word came from a man named Lee. “It’s parked in my street, have sent you a pm with my phone number!” read the comment. He soon reported back to the swarm of commenters that replied. “Have spoken with Chris, he’s on his way. I’m staying with the car until he arrives.”
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As seen in a follow-up story on Instagram, Harris was quick to act. “So I’ve just had a note off someone on Instagram saying the M5’s on a residential street in North Bristol, just parked up, so I’m heading out there now,” said Harris. “World’s a mad place… why would you leave it on a residential street?” Heading over, he mused as to what might happen. “See what it’s all about shall we? Got a golf club in the boot, anyway.”
Harris drove to get his M5 in a much newer M5, taking along an English Bull Terrier which he deemed “quite handy” when picking up a stolen car under such circumstances. Soon enough, he was rounding the bend to find Lee standing with his BMW. “There it is, my M5, up on the pavement,” he said, bemused, as his beloved car came into view. “What a strange world this is!” Thankfully, there was no need for the golf club in the boot.
The car wasn’t in the best shape by the time Lee and Harris got to it. One of the wheels had picked up some nasty curb rash. Interior trims had also been ripped off to gain access to the ignition, with wires ripped out and dangling everywhere as a result of efforts to hotwire the car. One of the rear quarter windows was also smashed, which appears to be how the thief or thieves gained entry to the vehicle.
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Still, the car is otherwise all there, and this story could certainly have had a much worse outcome. While there was little fuel left in the tank, Harris was still able to start the M5, suggesting the mechanicals are still presumably in good form.
Having a car stolen sucks, but it’s nice when you can rely on an army of strangers to keep an eye out for your ride. Harris will be thanking Lee and his other fans for so effectively getting his car back within a day or so of it being stolen. It doesn’t get much better than that.
Image credits: via harrismonkey (Instagram)
It’s because of the airtags that car thiefs park the cars up on public roads. It was on this street (the postcode is in one of the screenshots):
https://maps.app.goo.gl/GGqqTxFc56mLMKzm6
and it seems a pretty nice area, all things considered. What is has in its favour for a thief is that it’s a cul-de-sac in an estate that people wouldn’t ordinarily drive through.
They’ll park the car somewhere like this for a few days to see whether anyone comes and gets it – which is only really likely if the car had an airtag or similar. If it’s still there after a few days they’ll drive it away.
Chances are it was stolen to order – if you’re a drug addict after an easy ride home you wouldn’t smash the smallest window on the car to get into it. I hope Chris installs a tracker after this!
I’ve taken to hiding an AirTag somewhere in my car. Might not help in a lot of cases, but for something like this would have been quite useful.
It’s a really good idea. You should also remove the speaker, otherwise when the thieves get in the car the airtag will start pinging them.
That’s a good point. I’m pretty sure it’s in an obscure enough location you wouldn’t hear the beeps anyways, but definitely something to consider.
Us Jeep XJ owners have already taken to putting a hidden fuel cut switch in the car
I had a hidden fuel pump kill switch installed in my old Integra Type R back in the day. When the thieves came, because they couldn’t get the car started, they rolled it down the street a bit to a secluded area and stripped it of all it’s ITR-specific parts. The insurance company paid to repair the car but it was never quite the same to me.
In hindsight, I would rather they just made the whole car disappear.
I did the same on my Mk2 MR2, always thought alarms were stupid because of all the false alarms always going off. I did install an alarm too though,, but only because it was one of the early ones with remote locks, it also auto locked the doors 30 sec after parking.
Ah well, Clifton is where the worst criminals in Bristol live, the white-collar criminals.
(It’s the posh bit of the city)
Then it makes sense to leave it there if they intended to sell it off later. Leave it in the crummy neighborhood and the local hooligans would strip it bare overnight.
In my best impression: Ferris Bueller, you’re my hero.
Yay for recovery!
Sometimes they park a car to see if it’s being tracked.
Other times it’s simply near where they live.
This thief doesn’t give off mastermind vibes to me, parking the stolen uncommon car on a public road. But then maybe it was just a joyride and they abandoned it once they ran low on fuel.
Or got home?
Police are so ineffectual now smart thieves don’t even have to act smart.
Someone parked a running, apparently stolen car in my drive.
I got in to move it, then decided to leave it far enough away it would be hard for the thieves to find.
After I had my car stolen it was returned full of stolen papers, none of them mine.
So the thieves could be tracked to other thefts and locations.
Police hadn’t noticed.
I had to call them to pick up the papers.
That’s amazing. “Hey I don’t mean to tell you how to do your job, but you left all the evidence in my car.”
Barely scratches the surface of police incompetence and corruption locally.
My guess is that they park the car in a random place until heat is off the car. If it’s not found or flagged as suspicious, they come back some hours/days later to pick it up and take it to the real place they don’t want you to find. That’s when you lose it for good.
I had a 1990 Honda Accord Wagon stolen from in front of my house on a Saturday night, about 15 years ago. Never got it back.
The feeling you have when you wake up, look out the window, and see that something that once was there, is not longer there, is wretched.
My only hope is that it is still on the road gobbling up the miles, but it most likely ended up in a chop shop in Bridgeport in pieces within hours.
Still miss that car.
“Wait, I’ve found some sort of papers in the seat crease…what’s all this? Larry Sellers? Hey Larry! Larry! Do you want to know what happens when you find a stranger’s M5 in the council?!”
Grabs golf club (er, bat) and walks toward nearest Nissan Micra
“This is what happens, Larry! THIS. Is what happens, Larry!”
Pensioner walks out, appalled…
You’re getting a lot of mileage out of that scene 🙂
It’s the gift that keeps on giving!
My only regret is that I didn’t save it for this perfect situation 🙂
Stealing an E28 M5 should be punishable by being forced to maintain a modern, out of warranty BMW.
Either that, or by Spanish Inquisition.
Death by Jatco CVT
Well, that was unexpected…
Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!
But I expected the jokes. 😀
Our chief weapon is surprise…surprise and fear…fear and surprise…
Oh wait…
Time to upgrade from a golf club in the boot to a trunk monkey.