Police steal a march on Star man Tony

SPARE a thought for The Star's transport correspondent Tony Belshaw who had his car stolen last week - by the police!

Tony parked his car in a side road near the city centre and returned later to find an empty space where he was sure he had parked it. After searching fruitlessly he reported it stolen.

Thankfully he found his car half an hour later, parked around a corner. He immediately called the coppers again and told them to forget it all.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The next day he gets a call from the police. Can they take some details of his stolen car?

“No, no it’s not stolen,” he tells them. “I thought it was for half an hour, but it wasn’t. My mistake. Forget all about it. It was just a mistake.”

Fast forward a week and Tony returns to almost the same spot to pick up his car again - only this time it has gone. Really, truthfully gone. He checks, double checks, walks around for ages. No. This time it’s definitely gone.

A seriously miffed Tony calls the police again and reports that his car really has been stolen this week.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Later that evening he gets a call. The car’s in a police pound. You see, they had had a call a week before to say it was stolen. So it was found and impounded.

“What?” he said. “You’ve taken it? My car has been stolen - by the police?”

“Er, yes. I’m sorry mate. We've got egg all over our faces on this one,” said a sheepish sergeant at South Yorkshire Police. “It’s a bit of a farce, this one.”

Generously, the police didn’t charge him to collect his ‘stolen’ car from their Parkway Avenue pound the next morning.