Car stolen by pensioners on the lam from dementia care home
A mechanic in Germany had a shock when his car was stolen by two pensioners on the run from a care home for people with dementia.
Ingo Kurz left his own Dacia in the forecourt of his workshop with the keys in the ignition while he ran inside to answer the phone.
When he returned, the car was gone. A lorry driver told him he’d seen it speeding off with two pensioners inside.
“He said an elderly gentleman was behind the wheel and an even older gentleman was in the passenger seat,” Mr Kurz told Bild newspaper.
The 44-year-old lives in Neudorf, a tiny place of just 680 residents in the Harz mountains, a sparsely populated area of eastern Germany where crime is rare and people routinely leave their doors unlocked.
Panicking, he called the police while his wife went to look for the car. While he was giving a statement, his wife arrived with the news that she’d seen the blue Dacia 12 miles away.
When police tracked down the vehicle, they discovered a story that could have come straight out of the bestselling novel The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared.
The two car thieves were residents of a local care home for people with dementia. The driver was 77 years old, and the passenger was 86.
The two men had already been reported missing after they disappeared from the care home.
They told police they had set out to visit a friend in the neighbouring village of Aschersleben and thought it was their lucky day when they discovered Mr Kurz’s car with the key in the ignition
“Maybe the food wasn’t so good at the care home and they wanted to pop out,” Mr Kurz told the local Volkstimme newspaper.
“I suppose it’s my own fault, leaving the keys in the ignition. But we know everyone here in the village, that sort of thing just doesn’t happen here.”
The car was returned to Mr Kurz unharmed and the two pensioners were taken back to the care home.
Legally, they could face prosecution for vehicle theft, but prosecutors said they are unlikely to bring charges.
