Escort (shell found, parts still at large) London Mar 2021

Be interesting to find that transit and stick a tracker on it, see where it goes...
Of course i bet that’s kept in a lockup!

It's not just that, it's the fact that it's property and should be insured. As far as the police are concerned, no-one was hurt and the owner would get an insurance payout.

I don't agree with it either, but due to budget cuts and increased pressures for targets, they'll continue to hit the soft targets like regular motorists.

Insurance payouts don't go towards any sentimental value and the hundreds of hours of hard work.
Insurance won't ccover some old gent's car that he's had since new in the 70s that he's taken care of and looked after up until the point where it's taken from him. Or a car that now belongs to the kids of a dad who passed and have memories of that car and their parent. Insurance won't cover that.

Insurance won't cover people being afraid to own or use a certain type of car for fear that some ne'r do wells will have it away before the end of the day if they leave it out somewhere.

A lack of police action has so many knock on effects to all walks of life, but still. Here's your crime reference number. Go claim and leave us alone. We won't be looking for it unless it falls on our laps.

I have a road legal motorcross in my garage, I know full well that if I leave that unattended anywhere for too long it won't be there when I get back. I used to kill the engine at the end of the road and coast down my road so it wasn't obvious where it was kept. My dad and his mates all were followed and most of them had their bikes nicked out of garages.
Nothing ever came of that. Usual excuse of, "Oh, it's daytime/nightime/windy/sunny/rainy/snowy/January so there won't be any forensic evidence for us." Pretty defeatist if they haven't even come out and looked.

I know someone, quite some time ago now and it's only got worse since, who had a nearly new car broken into once, in a public and very concealed car park. The driver window was smashed, radio stolen and when called, the police asked if it could be left overnight, in situ (i.e. in the unlit car park where it had already been targeted) without being touched in any way (as it would damage the 'evidence' ) and that although the forensic team were available they weren't really bothered about criminal damage /theft ...

... needless to say, it was pointed out to them that if it were left there overnight there wouldn't be much, if anything, left to forensically examine come morning and not to bother coming out as it was clearly too much trouble for them to bother. They offered a crime number and were told to **** off as the new window was below the excess and the audio wasn't covered under the policy anyway.

I'm always in support of the police, it's a thankless job and most of them are decent enough guys but that experience really underlined my opinion that 99% of the time (not due to them either) they are about as useful as a chocolate teapot these days.

On topic please guys. That is, just info relating SPECIFICALLY to the theft/recovery of the car in question.

I definitely watched a facebook video of that Transit lifting a BMW convertible.
I just cant find it.
But I will and I'll share it here.

Yes the video works and looks the same transit to me

Did anyone see a video of a similar truck dragging a car down a road hitting loads of parked cars? Was last year I think. Sure it's the same truck

“The truck was found abandoned at a traveller site” ... That wasn’t abandoned - they just parked it where they lived and when the police turned up they said it was abandoned. Maybe. Probably.