The Telegraph readers who did the police's job themselves
When Mia Forbes Pirie and her husband Mark Simpson found their Jaguar E-Pace had been stolen from outside their house in west London, they used the AirTag it was fitted with to discover it was now parked less than three miles away. Keen to act as quickly as possible, they contacted the police – who gave no indication as to whether they could help or not. In the end, the couple was forced to retrieve the stolen car themselves.
We covered this story earlier in the week, and outrage followed – as did, rather tellingly, an outpouring of weary recognition. Hundreds of Telegraph readers got in touch to say: us too. When our things are stolen – be it bikes, laptops, mobile phones or cars – we no longer expect the cavalry. Instead, we find ourselves playing detective with AirTags, GPS tracking and doorbell cameras. In other words, doing the police's job for them.
It is vigilante justice via the apps on our phones. And, given how few thefts result in a charge and how many cases are closed almost as soon as they are opened, it seems increasingly like the best tool at our disposal.
John Devaney, a 48-year-old property maintenance worker from the Thames Valley, is still haunted by the memory of waking up to discover his beloved Triumph Stag, a 1970s classic worth £10,000, had vanished from his garage. He turned to the tracker app on his phone. There it was: parked on a driveway 25 miles away.
He called the police and gave them the address. 'They said they would send someone at some point in time,' he recalls. 'That it wouldn't be long.'
Frustrated and anxious, Devaney drove there himself, hoping to meet the police. After half an hour of waiting, he decided to investigate alone. Under a tarpaulin in the driveway, he thought he could see a shape that looked suspiciously like his car – and when he lifted it to confirm, a man inside the house came out. 'He said he had bought it in a pub last night,' says Devaney. 'I said, 'No, you nicked it from my garage.''
The man then jumped in the car, mowed through the neighbour's hedge and sped off. Devaney followed. Eventually, he found the car abandoned at an industrial park. He rang the police again and waited an hour for them to arrive.
There were fingerprints. There was photographic evidence. There was an address. There was even an identity: Devaney says police told him the man was 'known to them'. Still, it was a month before he was interviewed. When the car, which Devaney has now sold, was returned three months later, he was told no further action would be taken.
'I couldn't have handed it to them any better,' he says. 'There was not much more I could have done for them.' According to the police, officers received a report of the theft of a vehicle from a residential property. Detectives carried out a thorough investigation in which a man in his 40s was arrested. Following further enquiries, the case did not meet the threshold for criminal charges.
Another Telegraph reader, pest controller Chris Johnson, 59, and his wife Paula, 57, were struck not once but twice at their house in Kent.
The first time, a white Jeep Wrangler – worth £45,000 – vanished without a trace. The police issued a crime number, and not much else.
Six months later, it happened again. A £39,000 Ford Ranger disappeared from the same spot. This time, however, they had learnt their lesson and fitted it with two trackers. The Johnsons were watching football at home when it happened. 'Someone must have walked straight up and driven off,' Chris says.
The tracker showed it heading towards Eltham, and they immediately called the police. No answer. They jumped into Paula's Mini and followed the signal.
'We eventually tracked it to a housing estate in Eltham,' says Chris. 'We tried the police again, but still nothing. We sat there for 10 minutes watching the car, not knowing what we were walking into. I told Paula to get ready. If anything kicked off when I went to get the vehicle, she was to drive off and leave me.'
Chris cautiously approached his car, tried his key, and to his relief, it unlocked. The thieves had ripped out most of the interior in an attempt to locate the trackers, successfully finding and disabling the manufacturer's system. But Chris's secondary tracker had gone undetected; he drove it home.
The police got back to them hours later. The response? 'Well, you've got it back now.'
Paula recalls explaining to the police that they had wanted them there while they rescued their car because they were scared of what they might find. 'He replied that they were overstretched, even having to work on Sundays, and that was that. We never heard anything more.'
Since then, the Johnsons have doubled down on security: ghost immobilisers, steering locks, the works.
'If Sadiq Khan is putting up all these cameras and charging us more to drive, then why not use them to track down stolen vehicles?' says Chris. 'Imagine how many cars could be recovered. He might even look like a hero.'
A Metropolitan Police spokesman says: 'Every incident of vehicle theft is carefully assessed to identify and pursue possible lines of enquiry, including forensic evidence and available footage. We advise victims to report crimes via appropriate channels.'
Sadly, these are far from isolated cases. Ashley Sollit tells us about the night four electric vehicles were stolen from one street in Brent. His son-in-law – who was one of the victims – had an AirTag in his car and traced it to a council estate nearby, where he later found his and his neighbours' cars. He phoned the police, who advised that he should drive his own vehicle home and tell the neighbours to get theirs. This was, apparently, standard practice, as thieves often leave stolen cars out for a week to see which ones have trackers. When it was suggested to the police that the cars should be left in place to try to catch the criminals, the response from the police was short, but clear. 'We don't have the time.'
Similarly, Ian Smith writes in with a story about his granddaughter, who had her car stolen from the hospital car park where she works. CCTV captured the crime, but when Smith's granddaughter suggested the police watch the footage, as it clearly showed the make and model of the car that the thieves arrived in, she was rebuffed. Luckily, the car was fitted with an insurance tracker; when it pinged with a location, the police told her to collect it herself.
There is something rather depressing about these remarkably similar stories that speak to our new normal. We know, of course, that resources are stretched – but the message felt by many Britons is a stark one: if something is stolen, you're probably on your own. The result? Where we once relied on the police, now we depend on Bluetooth and Apple to keep us safe.
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A couple in London, U.K., stole back their car after they experienced a lack of police support in recovering the stolen vehicle, the wife said in a post on LinkedIn. 'I have to confess … it was kind of fun stealing back our own car… ,' Mia Forbes Pirie, 48, wrote. An international mediator, facilitator and coach, Forbes Pirie referred to her husband Mark Simpson, 62, as her partner in 'un-crime.' The husband, as per his LinkedIn profile, is a commercial barrister in Greater London. 'But it does make me wonder whether we should have had to do that,' she continued in the LinkedIn post. 'And not whether it's normal, but whether it's right that the police seem to have no interest in investigating what is likely to have been a reasonably sophisticated operation involving a flat bed truck… if there are no consequences, what is the incentive for people not to do more of this?' Their car, a Jaguar and reportedly worth over $85,000, was stolen from near their residence in Brook Green, West London. According to The Times, the lawyer couple, after contacting the police, were told that the Metropolitan Police reportedly wouldn't be able to investigate. 'Instead, the couple suggested they could find the vehicle themselves and were told to call 101 if they found it,' The Independent reports. The couple noticed the car missing a week ago, with the AirTag locating it to their road, in what may have been a 'cooling-off period' for the stolen car that one Canadian car owner was made aware of in May last year. CAA Quebec spokesperson and former police commander André Durocher told CTV News that after a vehicle is stolen, thieves will often leave the stolen vehicle nearby. 'They want to see if there's going to be police surveillance to check the vehicle, if there was a tag [to track it], so it's very standard procedure for car theft rings to function that way,' Durocher told CTV. The AirTag for the car in London later pinged from Chiswick, which is where the couple eventually found it with interior and carpets ripped off. The Metropolitan Police, in a statement to The Independent, confirmed that they were alerted to a car theft on June 3. 'Officers spoke to the victim, who shared his intention to recover the vehicle himself. An Apple AirTag was inside, allowing the victim to view its location and trace it. The victim was reminded by officers to contact police again as needed or if police assistance was necessary at the vehicle's location. At 11:23hrs the victim confirmed with police that he had found the vehicle and that it was being recovered by a truck back to the victim's home address.' 'The police are under-resourced and it's a shame,' The Independent reports Forbes Pirie as saying. 'Since we've found it, lots of people have touched the car and the police say that they're going to look underneath the carpets and at the fuse box to see if there are prints there. But it wouldn't have cost very much for them to tell us not to touch anything. That's the one criticism I have.' The police said the investigation is ongoing and that no arrests have been made at this stage. Canada has become a very scary place to own a vehicle right now Instead of getting their stolen car back, Canadian couple received $156 parking ticket Our website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark and sign up for our daily newsletter, Posted, here.
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Lawyer couple 'steal back' their stolen car after tracking it with Apple AirTag
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The Telegraph readers who did the police's job themselves
When Mia Forbes Pirie and her husband Mark Simpson found their Jaguar E-Pace had been stolen from outside their house in west London, they used the AirTag it was fitted with to discover it was now parked less than three miles away. Keen to act as quickly as possible, they contacted the police – who gave no indication as to whether they could help or not. In the end, the couple was forced to retrieve the stolen car themselves. We covered this story earlier in the week, and outrage followed – as did, rather tellingly, an outpouring of weary recognition. Hundreds of Telegraph readers got in touch to say: us too. When our things are stolen – be it bikes, laptops, mobile phones or cars – we no longer expect the cavalry. Instead, we find ourselves playing detective with AirTags, GPS tracking and doorbell cameras. In other words, doing the police's job for them. It is vigilante justice via the apps on our phones. And, given how few thefts result in a charge and how many cases are closed almost as soon as they are opened, it seems increasingly like the best tool at our disposal. John Devaney, a 48-year-old property maintenance worker from the Thames Valley, is still haunted by the memory of waking up to discover his beloved Triumph Stag, a 1970s classic worth £10,000, had vanished from his garage. He turned to the tracker app on his phone. There it was: parked on a driveway 25 miles away. He called the police and gave them the address. 'They said they would send someone at some point in time,' he recalls. 'That it wouldn't be long.' Frustrated and anxious, Devaney drove there himself, hoping to meet the police. After half an hour of waiting, he decided to investigate alone. Under a tarpaulin in the driveway, he thought he could see a shape that looked suspiciously like his car – and when he lifted it to confirm, a man inside the house came out. 'He said he had bought it in a pub last night,' says Devaney. 'I said, 'No, you nicked it from my garage.'' The man then jumped in the car, mowed through the neighbour's hedge and sped off. Devaney followed. Eventually, he found the car abandoned at an industrial park. He rang the police again and waited an hour for them to arrive. There were fingerprints. There was photographic evidence. There was an address. There was even an identity: Devaney says police told him the man was 'known to them'. Still, it was a month before he was interviewed. When the car, which Devaney has now sold, was returned three months later, he was told no further action would be taken. 'I couldn't have handed it to them any better,' he says. 'There was not much more I could have done for them.' According to the police, officers received a report of the theft of a vehicle from a residential property. Detectives carried out a thorough investigation in which a man in his 40s was arrested. Following further enquiries, the case did not meet the threshold for criminal charges. Another Telegraph reader, pest controller Chris Johnson, 59, and his wife Paula, 57, were struck not once but twice at their house in Kent. The first time, a white Jeep Wrangler – worth £45,000 – vanished without a trace. The police issued a crime number, and not much else. Six months later, it happened again. A £39,000 Ford Ranger disappeared from the same spot. This time, however, they had learnt their lesson and fitted it with two trackers. The Johnsons were watching football at home when it happened. 'Someone must have walked straight up and driven off,' Chris says. The tracker showed it heading towards Eltham, and they immediately called the police. No answer. They jumped into Paula's Mini and followed the signal. 'We eventually tracked it to a housing estate in Eltham,' says Chris. 'We tried the police again, but still nothing. We sat there for 10 minutes watching the car, not knowing what we were walking into. I told Paula to get ready. If anything kicked off when I went to get the vehicle, she was to drive off and leave me.' Chris cautiously approached his car, tried his key, and to his relief, it unlocked. The thieves had ripped out most of the interior in an attempt to locate the trackers, successfully finding and disabling the manufacturer's system. But Chris's secondary tracker had gone undetected; he drove it home. The police got back to them hours later. The response? 'Well, you've got it back now.' Paula recalls explaining to the police that they had wanted them there while they rescued their car because they were scared of what they might find. 'He replied that they were overstretched, even having to work on Sundays, and that was that. We never heard anything more.' Since then, the Johnsons have doubled down on security: ghost immobilisers, steering locks, the works. 'If Sadiq Khan is putting up all these cameras and charging us more to drive, then why not use them to track down stolen vehicles?' says Chris. 'Imagine how many cars could be recovered. He might even look like a hero.' A Metropolitan Police spokesman says: 'Every incident of vehicle theft is carefully assessed to identify and pursue possible lines of enquiry, including forensic evidence and available footage. We advise victims to report crimes via appropriate channels.' Sadly, these are far from isolated cases. Ashley Sollit tells us about the night four electric vehicles were stolen from one street in Brent. His son-in-law – who was one of the victims – had an AirTag in his car and traced it to a council estate nearby, where he later found his and his neighbours' cars. He phoned the police, who advised that he should drive his own vehicle home and tell the neighbours to get theirs. This was, apparently, standard practice, as thieves often leave stolen cars out for a week to see which ones have trackers. When it was suggested to the police that the cars should be left in place to try to catch the criminals, the response from the police was short, but clear. 'We don't have the time.' Similarly, Ian Smith writes in with a story about his granddaughter, who had her car stolen from the hospital car park where she works. CCTV captured the crime, but when Smith's granddaughter suggested the police watch the footage, as it clearly showed the make and model of the car that the thieves arrived in, she was rebuffed. Luckily, the car was fitted with an insurance tracker; when it pinged with a location, the police told her to collect it herself. There is something rather depressing about these remarkably similar stories that speak to our new normal. We know, of course, that resources are stretched – but the message felt by many Britons is a stark one: if something is stolen, you're probably on your own. The result? Where we once relied on the police, now we depend on Bluetooth and Apple to keep us safe. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
