The NPR item didn't include any additional info, aside from the insurance
company making a windfall.  It was one of those 15-second funny clips for
filler.  I did wonder how a van that apparently had been sitting in a
container for decades could be in such good condition, though!

J.

On Mon, Nov 9, 2009 at 6:14 PM, Ken Wilford <kenwilfy@comcast.net> wrote:

> Actually this story shows you how misleading the media can be and how they
> can spin stories to seem to say something that they don't really say.  They
> word and phrase the story so that the overall impression you get is that
> here is a VW Bus that was stolen 35 years ago and was recently found in a
> container in pristine condition.  However if you read the story more
> carefully you find out that bus has probably been owned and driven by
> someone this entire time because actually how it wound up in the container
> is that a company in Nevada (I believe) just recently did a full restoration
> on it and then sold it to a customer in the Netherlands.  So the bus has
> only been in the container for a short time, it was being inspected to be
> shipped overseas and the reason it is in pristine shape is that the guys at
> the bus restoration shop had just went over it in order to sell it for an
> inflated price to a person in the Netherlands.  So you see how things can
> get twisted up so easily.  Now the story isn't so hot.  The guys at the
> restoration shop are out a bunch of money because they probably bought the
> van from someone else with a bill of sale.  The fact that the van was stolen
> probably didn't show up when the had the title transferred to them because
> the DMV of California and Nevada weren't connected back in the day.  So the
> only reason this came to light was that the van had been stolen in
> California and that is where they were doing the final inspection before
> shipping it out.  So the shop owners are out a bunch of money just because
> the DMV of Nevada dropped the ball and didn't know this was a stolen vehicle
> from the get go.  Who knows who the original thief was but he probably sold
> it to some unsuspecting person in Utah or Nevada back in the day so he is
> long gone.  I hate that this bus was stolen but really at this point
> everyone who is involved is an innocent victim and the insurance company
> gets a windfall because they paid out $1200 back in 1974 and they now can
> auction this bus off for probably 20 times that and the Nevada shop gets
> nothing!  Not only that but you can't do a carfax on something this old and
> there really isn't a comprehensive way to check old titles so it will
> probably happen again in the future.  Next time ship it out of the port of
> New York!  That is the lesson to be gleaned from this deal.  :-)
>
> Ken Wilford
> John 3:16
> www.vanagain.com
>
>
> Joy Hecht wrote:
>
>> Did anyone else hear the bit on Morning Edition about a vanagon stolen
>> decades ago that just showed up in a shipping container routed for
>> Germany?
>> Apparently it had been there all along, and is in pristine condition.
>> Belongs to Allstate, which had paid off the insurance claim ages ago.
>>
>> Yippee, the vanagon made it to NPR with something other than Car Talk
>> ridicule!
>>
>>
>>
>> Joy
>>
>>
>>
>