Stolen car stories are all too common in this world, but this one has an unbelievable twist. According to a U.K. man, his beloved 2016 Honda Civic Type R was unlawfully taken from him earlier this year; then, three weeks later, he accidentally bought it back.
Ewan Valentine, the owner of the Honda, recently shared his incredible story on his Instagram page. Back in February, he says, his Honda was stolen from his driveway. He had owned the car for about three years — and like many Type R owners, he had begun modifying the car, for example adding a Remus exhaust.
Since he loved the car, he told Road & Track, he wanted to buy one as similar to the one that was stolen as possible, and eventually found one very similar to his for sale at a local garage that was very similar to his: the plates, VIN and mileage were different, but the color and model year matched, and the car even had the same Remus exhaust system fitted.
Valentine says he got the car home, and started to notice a few little things: the trunk held a tent peg and some pine needles from a Christmas tree, just like his old car had in back; likewise, the locking wheel nut key was in the exact same sort of bag he’d kept his old one in.
“So, looking for something more conclusive, I check the satnav history,” he wrote on Instagram. “Sure enough, my address, my partners parents’ address, my parents’ address. It dawned on me at this point that my phone immediately connected without pairing. My phones is in the Bluetooth device history, my partner’s phone, and all our old phones.”
He says he then took the car to a nearby Honda garage, where the technician hooked up the shop’s computer to the ECU and discovered that the original VIN for the “new” Honda matched Valentine’s old ride. He had, apparently, just purchased his own stolen car.
Valentine doesn’t believe that the app he used to find the car or the place he bought it from had any idea it was stolen so he didn’t want to call them out by name. “I did report the sellers, but there was absolutely nothing untoward about them,” he said.
As far as a criminal investigation, Valentine told Road & Track that “there have been no arrests, and the case is paused for now.” He went on to say that the people that stole his car did a very convincing job cloning it — and that his problem now is with the insurance folks.
“The insurance company have taken ages to process the whole situation, and I got the impression they weren’t entirely sure what to do about the whole situation,” he said. He believes it will be several weeks before he gets his car back. For now, he says he’s stuck driving his partner’s 2007 Civic Type S, which Valentine described as “a lot less fun to drive.”
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