A woman took her SUV to be serviced and didn’t get it back. Hampton, Virginia, police confirmed someone stole the vehicle and drove off while the driver was waiting at Firestone Complete Auto Care on Marketplace Drive.
Cheryl McClanahan said she took her blue 2012 Ford Escape to the car center to repair her air conditioning.
“I looked out at about 9:15 and noticed it was still back there and they were still working on it. Approximately 9:30, I noticed the cop car coming in front of the service,” McClanahan said.
She said she didn’t think much of police being there until an employee came over to her.
“I started getting up. He says, ‘No, ma’am. You need to sit down.’ I say, ‘Okay, how much is my A/C repair going to cost me?’ He says, ‘Not a thing.’ I said, ‘Why?’ He says, ‘because your car was just stolen.’ I’m like, ‘What?'”
Hampton police said a Firestone employee left the SUV running and unattended, then someone on a brown bicycle came up, hopped inside and drove off. The suspect is described as a black male, last seen wearing a white shirt and white hat.
McClanahan said she is driving a rental provided by Firestone for now, but she thinks the business should replace her vehicle.
“Everybody says, ‘You got your car, what? Stolen? Where?’ ‘Firestone.’ ‘Why?,’ and it’s like, how can that happen? I’m still asking why and how?" McClanahan said. "I think people need to watch out where you go, wherever you’re at. It could happen just by you just standing there.”
A spokeswoman for Bridgestone Retail Operations, which owns the business, would not go into the details of the incident, but said that the corporate claims center was closed. She said someone from the corporate claims center will be calling McClanahan soon to get all of the information to reach a resolution.
This article originally appeared on Wavy.com.
