KEARNY/HARRISON –
From the Department of You Can’t Make This Stuff Up comes this story of a stolen car, and how it came to be stolen, and how it came to be found, and what happened to it along the way.
At 8:30 a.m. on Friday, Dec. 30, KPD Officer Ben Wuelfing responded to an E. Midland Ave. address where the resident, a 48-year-old woman, had discovered that her 2001 VW Beetle was missing from her driveway, police said.
According to the police report, she had parked it there at about 8:30 the previous evening and “she left her keys, her purse and her cellphone in the vehicle because she was tired after work.” (As we said, you can’t make …)
When Wuelfing contacted headquarters, he learned that a Kearny-registered VW was currently in the custody of the Harrison PD.
According to that department, the auto had been travelling along Davis Ave. at 11:12 p.m. the night before when a Ford Focus 1) ran a red light at the Hamilton St. intersection and, 2) smashed into the Beetle. (As we said …)
Both drivers then reportedly fled the scene, the Beetle thief escaping on foot and abandoning the stolen car. Alas, police were unable to obtain a description of the perp or determine if anyone else was with him.
Police said the Ford was located “a few minutes later” on nearby Cleveland Ave., along with its driver, a Rutherford man, who was charged with leaving the scene of an accident.
Harrison PD towed the poor little wounded Beetle from the crash site, but it was subsequently reunited with its Kearny owner.
