Renting a car through Turo can be hazardous to your health. Three young men visiting sunny Glendale, Arizona, got a lot more danger and excitement from their vacation than they expected. Police there are a lot more diligent about enforcing car theft reports, the victims note, than cops back home in Washington, D.C. They’re trying to figure out if they have any grounds to file a lawsuit but probably don’t.
Turo rental adventure
The blue Dodge Charger was legitimately rented through Turo but Glendale Police didn’t know that. They had an active stolen vehicle report attached to the plate.
There wasn’t any “racial profiling” involved because it was a robot license plate reader that flagged the car and it’s location. Officers swooped in with guns drawn to efficiently surround and detain the suspects.
Thankfully for all involved, the occupants of the Turo didn’t try anything cute. “I think we’re going to need a refund,” the driver was heard declaring on the bodycam footage. All three carefully obeyed the officers’ commands.
The driver politely explained how they came to be in possession of the charger, proved it with the proper documents and they were all promptly released. Cops even gave them a lift back to where they were staying.
The incident happened on the night of February 1, at 79th Avenue and Bell Road. That’s an active and interesting neighborhood for police on the Northwest side of metro Phoenix.
The driver did the right thing to diffuse the situation by simply explaining the truth. “If you want to unlock the phone, I can definitely show you. Big ol’ misunderstanding.”
Blame the owner
Glendale Police handled the entire incident by the book. An alert popped up on their “Real Time Crime Center” that an AI license plate reader noticed a “stolen car turning into a shopping center.”
The driver quickly admitted it wasn’t his but he rented it through Turo earlier in the day. That’s “a carsharing company that allows people to rent cars directly from the owner through an app.” The owner didn’t happen to mention that he had reported it stolen previously. Or that he never bothered to let police know he got it back.
“Whoever did this is doing something to us. I had no idea about this. I got this thing today. Keys were handed to me over at that address right there,” the driver nervously insisted. Officers soon verified the rental agreement “and let the men go without incident.”
Turo confirms that the owner “didn’t report that the stolen car was recovered.” They’re looking into ways of preventing the same thing from happening in the future. They did give the client his refund.
Glendale Police issued a statement with their side of it. According to Glendale Police Department Public Information Officer Jose Santiago, “this was a textbook traffic stop for a report of a stolen car.” Officers deserve a pat on the back. “We were able to quickly realize these were innocent bystanders who were taken advantage of.”
Nobody was shot because everyone stayed calm. Police are not happy with the Turo car’s owner. “It’s on the owners of these individual properties, if you will, to go ahead and let the app know what is going on. Had they done so, this car never would have been in the system and these folks never would have been taken for their money.“
