The Sheriff's Office of Lake County, Illinois, has reported on Facebook about a car theft and child abduction incident that took place last week. Notably, it said that a Volkswagen Atlas with tracking technology built in was stolen from a woman and when the police tried asking VW to track the vehicle, it refused until it received payment.
According to the Chicago Sun Times, the vehicle had a built-in feature called Car-Net that allows vehicle owners to track their cars. As the stolen vehicle was outside of its trial period for the feature, the police attempted calling up the manufacturer to get it re-enabled. At this point, the police hit a snag as the person on the other end of the line said the feature would cost $150 to switch on.
In response, police had to get a credit card number and call back the representative to get Car-Net working; however, by this time, the child had been rescued and the vehicle had been located so Car-Net’s data was useless. Volkswagen has stated that its processes were breached by the call handler and is now addressing the situation with the involved parties.
At the time of the theft, the woman had already taken one of her kids inside the house but when she went for the other child, one of the thieves knocked her to the ground and she was also run over during the getaway. Luckily, the child that was abducted was unharmed and the woman was being treated in the hospital for serious injuries but was in a stable condition.
Source: Lake County IL Sheriff's Office (Facebook) via Chicago Sun Times
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