Finding out your car has been stolen is a heart-wrenching moment for any car enthusiast. It happens all too often, and many cars are never the same after, if they’re even recovered at all. But sometimes, ever so rarely, fate shines a light, and reunites an owner with their pride and joy.
Tommy Bristol knows this story better than most. He’s a true gearhead, which is how he ended up importing a 1993 Nissan Skyline GT-R, back in 2018. He got himself a beautiful clean example of the Japan’s twin-turbo hero car, took great care of it, and even gave it a custom plate—”NOTLOUD.”
All was well, until his car was targeted by a dedicated thief. It was gone in a flash, but it was the power of the Colorado car community that helped bring it back.
Tommy took to the radio this past weekend to tell his story. Chatting with host Matthew West on Automotive ADHD, he explains the wild rollercoaster of events that saw his car disappear in the dead of night.
“It was stolen at like, three in the morning,” says Tommy. Despite keeping his car in an underground car park with a locked door and cameras, that wasn’t enough to keep it safe from the targeted smash-and-grab operation. “My neighbors came to me around four, and said, ‘Hey Tommy, we heard this huge crash,'” he explains. “‘A man drove another car through the garage door… [and] smashed the garage door off the building completely just to steal your car, and it’s gone.'”
The thief had literally used another stolen car as a battering ram to enter the underground lot. “Somehow, through scouting or otherwise, he knew there was a Skyline in that garage, and he wanted it so bad that he would literally dump another car and commit all this drama to it,” he muses. Speaking to KKTV 11, he noted the security footage made it obvious this was a specific hit. “From the security camera, he walked directly towards my car with his tools in hand.”
In the immediate wake of the theft, Tommy was “devastated and heartbroken”, in his own words. “When the sun started coming up, a friend of mine said ‘Hey, you need to post this… there are Colorado car groups on Facebook, you need to at least let people know,'” he says. “I said no, I don’t really use Facebook, I don’t really want to.” Despite his reluctance, Tommy’s persistent friend stepped up and offered to post on his behalf. “She posted for me on the Colorado Cars and Coffee [group] and a couple others, and that started to get attention,” he says. “Almost immediately people were posting pictures of my car!”
Reports began pouring in as people spotted the car around the city. “They had seen a skyline driving south on I25, they pulled out their phones to take a picture of the Skyline,” Tommy explained. “Then they maybe got home or got to work and saw the post on the Facebook group and said ‘Hey, I just saw that car and I took pictures.'”
He already had an army of car spotters hunting for his car, but he was distraught, all the same. “It feels like quite a violation, actually,” he said of the theft. “The whole time it was gone, I was having all of these thoughts and fears of what could be happening to my car.”
Thankfully, the power of social media paid off quickly. “Early on, people were just taking pictures of a Skyline they thought was cool, and then they realized it had been stolen,” he explains. “Later on we had people actively searching the city, driving around looking for the car. ” This netted enough information for Tommy to get a rough idea of where to find it, with reports narrowing down a few common areas. “I didn’t feel like the police were able to take action the way I wanted, so I drove down to [Colorado Springs] myself,” Tommy explains. “I live in Denver, I said I don’t care, I’m gonna go drive down there, I’m gonna go to these four places that it’s been reported multiple times.”
Amazingly, his strategy quickly bore fruit. “At one point, I even saw my own car driving north on Powers Boulevard,” he says, with a hint of the initial rush in his voice. “I was like, there’s no way I just saw my car!”
Try as he might though, it wasn’t an instant Hollywood ending. “I see the car, and I want nothing more than to jump the curb and go immediately speed after it and run every red light and slice through traffic,” he says. “But I’m in a Lexus GX470, I could maybe jump the curb but I’m not slicing through traffic very much and he already had a head start.” As much as he hoped to catch the car, it wasn’t to be. “Almost as quick as I saw him, I lost him… it was devastating, ” he recalls. “It was almost more difficult than if I never saw it at all, he was right there at my fingertips and then he got away.”
All was not lost, however, with providence smiling upon him a short while later.. “That night, at 11:30, I got a call from the El Paso County sheriff that they found the car in the Black Forest area and it’s being recovered,” he says. Tommy credits the community with helping save his car. “I’m convinced that the groups and all of the attention online word got to him eventually…” he says. “He started to see that there were photos of him driving my car, every few minutes, his location was being tracked.”
The car was literally found abandoned on the roadside by police. “He got sick of it or got afraid and he decided to drive out of the city a little bit, drop the car off, and leave it,” Tommy muses. “That’s my theory, because otherwise.., he didn’t strip the car, he didn’t wreck the car, he joyrided around a bit in it and then left it on the side of the road.”
The story made local media, too.Â
“It’s actually something I never expected to happen… and something that almost didn’t happen,” Tommy says. For now, his car is safe, but he’s yet to be reunited with his Nissan. “Right now it’s being held for evidence at an evidence lot, I need to wait for them to call me and let me know when they get you know, fingerprints and things like that out of the car,” he explains. “I’m hoping I can drive it out of there, if not I’ll have it towed.”
Ultimately, despite not being a big Facebook user himself, Tommy has a lot of gratitude for those who helped out. “I just want to say thank you to everybody online that commented on the post and gave some information and helped out,” he says. “My car was stolen and they recovered it 44 hours later… I’m nothing but grateful.”
While the story has a relatively happy ending, sadly this sort of thing isn’t unusual in Tommy’s area. As covered by Newsweek, crime data says Colorado is the national leader in car thefts, with 51.43 vehicles stolen per 100,000 citizens. It holds the unenviable top position ahead of New Mexico and Washington in second and third respectively. Meanwhile, Maine is apparently the safest state to park your car, with just 5.58 vehicles stolen per 100,000 citizens.
Many of us dread ever losing our prized vehicles, and are duly careful in turn. And yet, even when taking real precautions, you can still be caught out by a thief dedicated enough to ram their way into your building. Heck, even Nissan Australia saw their cherished example stolen out of their own secure lockup. When you’ve got a desirable car, it can be a target.
Despite this, stories like Tommy’s remind us how beautiful the car community can be. When the chips are down, it’s nice to know that there are other enthusiasts out there that have our back and are willing to help us bring our car home.
Image credits: via Facebook screenshot, Automotive ADHD via YouTube screenshot, KKTV 11 News | Southern Colorado via YouTube screenshot
Sorry ’bout the Creedence.
I honestly can’t believe the thief didn’t vandalize the hell out of it or set it on fire as a final F-you, since he clearly didn’t have any hangups about destroying stuff
Several years ago, I was living in an apartment complex and noticed a really nice 64 Mercury Comet convertible parked across from my apartment. I assumed the owner had recently moved in because I had a new neighbor. After a few days I saw the car was becoming covered with tree sap and mentioned it to the new guy. He said it wasn’t his.
The car was unlocked so I checked the glove box, found a registration and looked up the phone number. Within an hour the owner, his father, brother and the cops show up loaded for bear. The owner and his family were threating to literally kill me. The cops weren’t having that but were going to arrest me for stealing the car. Fortunately, My new neighbor came out and explained our conversation and was I able to prove I was nowhere near the bowling alley where it was stolen, I was at work with about fifteen co-workers. I didn’t want a reward or anything, but jeez. Anyway, be careful if you decide to get involved with any kind of stolen property in any capacity.
If Stephen King’s “Christine” taught me something it’s that you don’t steal cars in Maine.
Christine was set in Pennsylvania (novel) and California (movie)
Having had a car stolen out of the driveway once, I can relate. While it recovered later, the thieves purposely damaged it with razor knifes and crushing part if it. The part that got me is they smoked in it and used the gear shift to put out the cigs.
While repaired, I always felt the way that treated my car as a nasty feeling.
With the rare exception of large, well-organized theft rings that steal exotic/collectible cars to ship them overseas or strip them for parts, I never understand the logic of a thief who would steal something so visible.
I actually thought this article was going to be about the Nissan Australia car! They’re even the same color
This is why I only drive crappy cars. But seriously, glad it had a happy ending. Seems so strange for the thief for spend time planning the heist without a real plan for what to do with it after. Like drive it straight to the chop-shop or directly into a shipping container.
As much as I love living in Colorado, the car thefts along the front range are no joke. I know multiple people who have had their cars stolen out of their driveways, and when I head up into the mountains I see abandoned cars on any of the trails that originate near population centers – often times stripped and sitting on cinder blocks. Glad this story resulted in a better ending than most others.
This reminds me of the stolen R32 in canada back in 2008… difference was that they thief was known, and had a distinctive feature that became memed.
https://forums.beyond.ca/threads/212943-1991-skyline-gt-r-stolen!-calgary-ab-cash-reward*pics-of-criminals-inside*
I’ve benefitted from the internet community as well after my 2015 BMW R1200RR was stolen out of my (poorly) locked workshop. Seems I left the keys in it, a curtain open and (evidently) a sign that said “I’m an idiot – please steal” posted outside. But I digress.
Lock was cut and bike gone somewhere around 6:30am. Realized around 7:30.Police report around 8 with their comment to not anticipate seeing it again. My now-ex-wife works at a motorcycle dealer and a friend there posted it to the RVA motorcycle facebook groups soon after. By mid-day people started posting sightings up and around the city. By early afternoon a different person saw it and started tailing the joy rider, losing them, then finding them again. Joy rider parked the bike in a sketchy neighborhood and that person hung out with it until they could get my number + the police arrived on site.
Bike was just a joy ride and was recovered damaged but in one piece. Clearly the rider wasn’t good at a clutch and it’d been dropped once or twice. Still, it returned thanks to a bunch of rabid people who happen to have the same likes and hobby!
“Joy rider parked the bike in a sketchy neighborhood…”
So east of the 95 or south of the River?
Good idea to invest in the theft deterrent devices for his car.
In 1989, my German friends and I took a road trip from Germany to Amsterdam then slingshot through Belgium and Luxembourg back to Germany. Well, the road trip was actually the “hashish trip” (no pun intended), buying the drugs legally there then smuggle them to Germany. In Amsterdam, his car was professionally and skillfully broken in and parted with the radio and ham radio equipment. Then, in Brussels, his car was broken into again: this time with hammer or something, damaging the rear side window.
My parents didn’t when we drove our 1991 Mercedes-Benz 230 E to Szczeczin, Poland for a day in January 2000. My father was standing nearby, guarding his car, while my mum and I went shopping for cheap stuff. Then, he glanced away to look at the display in the store for a minute. He heard a loud squeal and saw his car vanished.
When I lived in Dallas in the 1980s and 1990s, I knew my car was worth more in parts alone than its resale value as it was one of the most common American vehicles. I made some changes to the door locks and ignition cables. I used the magnet switch hidden behind the seat upholstery in the seat. To start the car, I just put the magnet on it. The door locks became impossible to get picked even by the locksmith so I had several extra keys made as “double insurance”. I could see the evidence of futile attempts to pick the locks with Slim Jim tool.
What was the ultra-desirable car in Dallas?
Regarding your Poland story, a Polish car spotter just posted pics of a W124 300D on Polish plates from early 1989; he commented on how risky it would have been to own that car back then. Your story certainly made that ring true!
“What was the ultra-desirable car in Dallas?”
Ford F150
I should have been able to figure that out!
I had a second, real ignition switch hooked up in the dash of my ’83 Subaru with the original remaining in the column, disconnected. Of course, nobody wanted it in the first place. I only did that as the old switch got broken and I noticed the punch out for the (center fog light?) switch I didn’t have was the perfect diameter to match the key. I preferred the switch there and it seemed simpler to rig up a new mounting behind the dash than to cut the security bolt/rivets to get the old switch out (it was pretty easy).
As a born and raised Coloradan, this makes me proud of my home state. There is a very real culture there of helping eachother when needed with no drama and this is a good example of that. Everybody working together to spot the car and make it too hot to handle is completely on brand. Unfortunately, the cops doing little about it is equally standard. 10 years ago in Denver, someone broke into my husband’s 240SX twice in one week, clearly trying to steal it. Both reports resulted in post cards in the mail saying the police were not investigating.
Were they colorful ‘Welcome to Colorado’ postcards, at least?
Well, it’s a fair bet they weren’t “Get High in Colorado” postcards…
This makes me want to put an AirTag in my own car to supplement the Ring Car Cam I have in there (which would have recorded the drives and face of the thief).
But it’s a good thing he has a unique car in a standout color – Otherwise, it would be lost forever.
Put in two – one in the glovebox to be found by the thief and another in a less-obvious place.
It certainly was helpful that he had a pretty rare car.
Yep, I put 2 in my MGB. 1 under the driver’s side carpet, and one in the trunk under the spare tire. I also have hidden wyze cams looking at it
I have highly visible cameras keeping an eye on my cars that don’t fit in the garage, they’re just mounted far higher than the average smash-and-grab thief is going to be able to reach, and there are multiple of them with intersecting views. They have motion floodlights, and there’s a warning at the top of my drive that cameras are in use. I’d rather deter them from ever coming down the driveway vs. making sure I have the footage after they’ve already stolen something.
I also use Airtags in hidden spots.
I’m going to be way dark and way nasty on that one, but let me tell you a story…
Decades ago in Bulgaria a cab driver’s wife called him frantically, weeping, and told him a black BMW sedan had stopped by her, men stormed out, snateched her five year old son from her and driven away.
The dad grabbed his car’s radio transimtter (all cabs had those), and launched an all out alert.
Within seconds, it became a very, very bad time and place to drive a BMW black sedan, a BMW, a sedan, or a black car altogether. Cabbies dropped everything, chased any car they thought could be the culprit, blocked them in, took drivers and passengers out. Accidents happened, it was a quite intensive hour or so.
An hour later the kid was found strangled in a park, and although there were not BMW drivers lynched or killed, things became really bleak and physical.
Protests erupted in front of the parliament, ministers had to explain why they were in their office working while kids were being abducted and killed, and so on. Then all cabbies pooled in front of the parliament.
Then another few hours later it turned out the mom was having every breakdown in every medical book, that her nuts and bolts had seen no Loctite in a while, and that she had strangled her kid when the poor thing peed himself after she had spent a full day cleaning up. Then cam up with the story and dumped him in the park.
So – for crowd-sourced detective work, I’ll report my findings to the police, and to no one else. Sorry to be a party pooper here.
um, ok
Sounds pretty similar to the Susan Smith case where she drowned her kids in the lake.
When I didn’t think this story could get any darker…….. Damn…..
Puts GTRs in perspective, huh 🙂
Still, despite the beauty of this here recovered GTR story, all of the above could very well be weaponized for all sorts of nefarious purposes.
A sense of emergency combined with unverifiable information, righteous anger and the impulse to do good is a combo that can go either ways, equally fast, depending on who owns the narrative.
Sad. It seems even Eastern Europe was not spared the killing spree of “Some Puerto Rican Guy”
https://southpark.fandom.com/wiki/Some_Puerto_Rican_Guy
Great outcome to a shitty story. I had a 1991 Accord Wagon stolen and not recovered about 12 years ago. Still hurts. I loved that car, and would still be driving it today if I could.
Positive endings are always great. A true Festivus miracle!