A Silver VW Polo Classic 2009, Registration no FCX 153 EC and belonging to Quan Baatjies was stolen from the parking lot in between the Dataflo offices and Virgin Active on Monday, 30 May 2011 at approximately 1:30 p.m.
Quan popped into the Humerail Waterfront Spar to buy some lunch and left his keys on the counter when leaving the Spar. Upon arriving at his place of employment, Dataflo, which overlooks the parking area behind Virgin Active he noticed his error as he did not have his access card with him which is attached to his car keys.
Returning immediately to Spar he was told that a colleague of his had picked up the keys and was returning them to him at Dataflo.
Quan returned to his offices and asked the reception to please group mail everyone to find out which colleague had ‘kindly’ returned with his keys.
Then Quan noticed that his car was missing from his parking spot that is visible from his office window.
Returning to Humerail Spar Quan viewed the footage which showed a suspect picking his keys up and talking to the staff who gesticulate towards the Dataflo offices. The suspect then walks out of the Spar and is seen leaving, with a cellphone in his left hand and a shopping bag in his right hand about two minutes after Quan.
The supposition is that the suspect walked after Quan and pushed the Polo’s remote to see which vehicle was on his ‘shopping list’.
The vehicle did have a vehicle tracking system installed. Tracker spokesperson, Gareth Crocker said; “Tracker is still searching for the vehicle and has spared no cost in trying to track it down. We have had a helicopter in the air and numerous vehicles have been dispatched. We are hopeful that the vehicle will still be found. We are working very closely with the police in investigating what is a highly unusual case, given the unique circumstances of the alleged theft.”
According to Quan there was another vehicle, a BMW, stolen from the same parking lot the next day (31 May).
There have been a number of incidents of vehicles stolen from the are over the last couple of years, which could have been minimised by the installation of CCTV cameras by landlord, Denton Properties.
The blurry still below shows the suspect exiting Humerail Spar.
If you have any information about this incident call Quan Baatjies on 041 508 4624 or 073 713 6080
Alan Straton
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So much for the Tracker claim of finding the vehicle before you even know it’s gone!
In all fairness, until the vehicle is recovered we will not know what went wrong. I understand that technology fails (how many times have you had to restart your computer recently, how many times has your burglar alarm failed to work?).
Technology is only as good as the person who manages / owns it – we tend to forget that we need to ensure that our technology / vehicles are in working order.
At the end of the day and without being able to actually see what went wrong, Tracker went beyond their brief and have attempted to recover the vehicle at great expense. I have been assured that the attempts to find the vehicle are ongoing – obviously it is to everyone’s benefit to find out why the initial quick recovery was not successful.
Tracker use the SAPS, who drive around in circles – until hopefully they stumble across the vehicle. I’d presume that the chopper was also SAPS – the bill thereof, footed by you and me. But Ja, things can go wrong, go wrong, go w
One hell of an opportunist – how on earth did he know that keys would be left there, fresh for the taking?