Vehicle Stolen In Broad Daylight From Dealership Service Bay

A man in Memphis, Tennessee took his vehicle into a dealership for an oil change, only to have it stolen. Lawson Arney went to Acura of Memphis in his 2010 Acura MDX looking for service. He dropped off the vehicle and left. After he left, he received a phone call from the Acura store indicating that somehow between his vehicle drop-off and the oil change, his SUV was taken by a car thief. Arney said he had just sat down at his desk at work when he learned that his five-year-old Acura was gone.

The story, according to a report by WMC out of Memphis, explained the car was stolen not outside of the store, but while it sat in the service bay. A man reported lingered near the service center before Arney dropped off his MDX. When questions by dealership staff about why he was hanging around, the man simply said he was waiting for his wife to bring her car in. That story turned out to be a complete fabrication.

When the MDX was sitting in the service bay, the loitering man jumped into the Acura and drove off. Dealership employees chased after the vehicle and even hopped into a vehicle and followed the man, but the car thief eventually lost them.

In response to the vehicle theft, Acura of Memphis has issued a statement on the matter. In a statement, Greg Hapke, the general manager of Acura of Memphis said, “The ownership team at Acura of Memphis and I have been very involved in making sure that this issue comes to a quick resolution with the customer being take care of at the highest level. It is an unfortunate situation and we have taken every step to make sure the customer is not inconvenienced in any way as we work closely with the insurance companies and authorities.”

Have you ever heard of something like this happening before? Are there other precautions could this dealer have taken to prevent this vehicle theft from their service bay?