Posted on 03/16/2022 3:01:31 PM PDT by lowbridge
The manager of a family-owned gas station in Houston, Texas, chased off suspected thieves, who he said had already taken more than a thousand gallons of diesel fuel from the store's underground tanks in separate incidents.
Jerry Thayil, whose father owns the Fuqua Express station, told CNN the thieves hit the station three days in a row last week and got away with between $5,000 and $6,000 worth of fuel.
They tried for a fourth time on Friday, but Thayil ran after them. Surveillance video shows him racing across the store's parking lot as a dark colored minivan drove off.
"I didn't want to just let them hit us again and lose another $1,200, $1,300," he said. "So I decided I would do something about it and I ran out there and chased them away."
The thefts come as police in the US are warning drivers to take steps to protect their vehicles from possible gas thieves as fuel prices surge to historic levels.
Thayil said he noticed discrepancies in the station's fuel levels on Wednesday and Thursday.
He went through the station's security footage and saw a dark minivan park on top of the lids covering the opening to the station's tanks on the days the fuel went missing.
Thayil said the van apparently was equipped with a trap door so the occupants could get to the tank and pump out the fuel without being seen. They were able to get away with 300-350 gallons of diesel fuel at a time, he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
He chased them over a jerry can of diesel?
If this trend continues, shots will be fired.
This was the technique from the 60’s book, “Steal this Book”.
More often than not the “evil” proprietors of those convenience stores will be treated far worse than any serial big time offender.
I remember that happening and there were incidents of this same kind of theft in the late 70’s. I thought they had created locks for the fueling refill covers?
Hopefully he was smart enough to at least get the license plate number.
These tanks should be locked. There should also put something over them, or bollards. The delivery trucks have a hose, so they shouldn’t have a problem. It’s time for some technology; electronic locks, perhaps?
“...300-350 gallons of diesel fuel...”
Damn BIG “jerry” can, huh??????
Not in Texas. Lethal force allowed to protect life or property.
Probably one of those 300 gallon white water containers.
“Thayil said the van apparently was equipped with a trap door so the occupants could get to the tank and pump out the fuel without being seen. They were able to get away with 300-350 gallons of diesel fuel at a time, he said.”
Clever. They were able to park over the tank, open the lid, pump over a ton of diesel fuel up into the van and just drive away.
One sane state at least.
I think that was sarcastic humor about the price of fuel, Biden did dat.
I remember a store problem with stolen gasoline when crooks found out they could clone a credit card by copying the data from the card’s magnetic strip. The crooks would take the cloned CC to a gas station, swipe the card at the pump and fill up. One station owner became creative and put a 200 gallon gas tank in a Pinto. Late night, after late night the crook would fill up the Pinto until one attendant looks at his monitors and thought WTF! Hundreds of gallons in a Pinto!
Yeah, that does fit...LOL
7 - 50 gallon drums upright in a van would do it.
I don’t know what type they were using.
Use incendiary ammunition. They’ll catch up.
That would put a minivan over its GVW.
The old trap door in the bottom of the van trick. That was popular in the Jimmy Carter oil crisis era. Haven’t heard of that since then.
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