The Algar Ferrari Heist: RCR Stories

welcome to rcr stories normally i do some long general preamble as a sort of prologue to introduce our topic but how do you introduce a crime as brazen as this one or a twist in the narrative as inexplicably dumb as you're about to hear i'm pretty sure there isn't much i can say to set this up other than to note that while heist movies and media tend to portray it as a crime of unmatched skill sometimes it's just as much about luck as anything else but luck is a temporary thing it has to be in order to meet the standard of the definition you can take your luck and turn it into a quality or trait over which you exert greater influence or control but luck can't be the totality of how you exist because luck inevitably runs out and unless you have something else going for you other than just being lucky then you're gonna have a bad time case in point a legend from recent pennsylvania history because we are pennsylvanians after all proud pennsylvanians but this wasn't a good look for the commonwealth this is rcr stories the algar ferrari heist our story begins with an airline pilot by the name of tom baker baker was an automotive enthusiast and something of an adrenaline junkie at least from what one might infer from his tendency to trick people into letting him drive exotic cars that they then never see again it all started when baker met with a cancer-stricken north carolina ferrari dealer by the name of steve barney baker's approach was not unlike the tactics of a soft-spoken pickup artist he didn't just sweet talk his victims he actually formed friendships with them for example upon learning barney was battling cancer baker told him he was a radiologist and offered to take a look at his x-rays to offer second medical opinion baker seemed every bit as invested in barney's well-being as he was in the 1989 ferrari 328 gts he had his eye on after all baker projected the image of affability decency and understanding barney once said if my 16 year old daughter needed a ride i would have put her in the car with him this was from an interview with the philadelphia enquirer's jason narc for his article lots of room for questions in this stolen car case which is some peak punnery that makes me proud to be a pennsylvanian needless to say it never even occurred to barney that baker was anything other than what he said he was and why would a self-styled doctor want to steal a car that in comparison to baker's later targets was a relatively modest 55 000 surely a radiologist could afford a ferrari which by that point was over 14 years old right the famed mid-engine v8 two-seater was among the apex offerings of its generation of sports cars and although they were 14 years removed from the heyday of the 328 it was a classic by any metric so it wasn't a surprise that a man like baker would be into a car like this and it required no suspension of disbelief to imagine he could afford it so when baker asked to take the car for a test drive barney handed over the keys i mean why not except that was the last he ever saw of tom baker i was conned i was conned and he did a beautiful job barney told the philadelphia enquirer i'm going on to say quote i try to believe in the genuine goodness of people i won't let that happen again end quote as for baker he got bolder as time went on tricking a long island ferrari dealer out of a 1985 testarossa the 12-cylinder rear mid-engine sports car with a reputation emboldened by the sheer volume of famous names to own one including elton john michael jordan mike tyson rod stewart and dr dre just to name a few but what's wild is that at least in the beginning baker didn't even try to sell these cars he kept them for private use like a criminal collecting trophies of his crimes he just wanted these fast cars he'd never be able to own legitimately at least not without falling headlong down the circular staircase of insurmountable dead and that's no fun for anybody except maybe the banks which leads us to the subject of this story the algar ferrari heist basically on september 16th 2003 tom baker waltz into algar ferrari maserati in rosemont pennsylvania just outside philadelphia mind you he didn't even have his driver's license on him at the time because privilege will get you everywhere especially when you're claiming to be the ceo of a tech firm out california way and gullible employees are all too willing to believe you his story at the time other than being a discount steve jobs was that he'd just flown in from atlanta and boy were his arms tired no but seriously he claimed to have flown to philadelphia specifically to look at an f50 baker was so eager to own one he said he was willing to make a down payment that very day just as soon as he was able to go out on a test drive to confirm everything was on the up and up so and again let me reiterate he didn't even have a driver's license on him at the time baker was handed the keys to a 1996 ferrari f50 valued at around 729 thousand dollars why so valuable well aside from the fact that it's a ferrari it was model number 29 out of just 349 models built and one of only 50 sent to the united states which makes it even more bizarre that they let some random guy come in and take it out for a spin the best explanation boils down to baker simply being really really convincing as detective charles craig of the lower marion police department told the philadelphia enquirer quote everyone was dumbfounded this guy totally played the part end quote so yeah bakers zoomed off at speeds of a hundred miles per hour racing away from the dealership with no intention of ever coming back it was the stupidest heist in the history of heists and i really can't help but feel sorry for the people who got duped even if you'd think common sense would have prevented this from happening in the first place the salesperson and the dealership came under tremendous scrutiny as a result of the investigation into the theft refusing to respond to requests for comment by the press and i can't say i blame them it can be hard looking down the barrel of your own mistakes like his other trophies baker kept this car for himself and didn't even take it out all that often maybe it was as much about the thrill of the heist as it was the exhilaration of the drive but he didn't leave it locked up forever no a fateful decision five years later led to this entire ball of yarn unraveling exponentially all right so baker had gotten away with it absconding with a rare ferrari f50 which utilized a 4.7 liter naturally aspirated 60-valve tipo f-130b v12 engine making some 512 horsepower and 347 pound-feet of torque now you'd think tracking this car down would be a fairly simple straightforward experience for the authorities since it's kind of hard to blend in when you're driving a car so brazenly ostentatious but that's the thing about baker part of why he was able to get away with his crimes for as long as he did was because he didn't really make a big show of having these cars sure he took them to the odd car show here and there and took them out for drives every now and then and because he had cultivated a personality of affluence wearing rolex watches and arriving in limousines to the dealerships where he'd perpetrate his frauds no one really questioned any of it in fact baker might have gotten away with the thefts altogether had he not decided to sell the f50 to an emergency room doctor in his native kentucky yes tom baker wasn't really lying when he told the algar ferrari salesman that he'd come up from the south solely to get a ferrari he simply lied about which state he was coming from baker was a divorced father of two whose ex-wife was a doctor which may have helped him convincingly portray a doctor in the north carolina heist or maybe not either way he wasn't some criminal mastermind he was just some random guy who really liked ferraris but suddenly found he needed money more than he needed the car so he sold it to the unnamed emergency room doctor using forged documents the price 375 000 around half of what the car was actually worth this was in 2008 five years after the car was stolen in the intervening period ferrari had hired a private investigator to track the card down but luck wasn't exactly smiling on the automaker the way it had been on tom baker that is until the doctor called baker to tell him there were issues getting the car registered to his name basically the doctor had called ferrari directly but when the company asked him for a copy of the title and the engine number well the jig was up concerned about the issue the doctor told baker who asked do the police know at that point they didn't but it seemed evident that they would soon enough so baker panicked and decided to refund the doctor his money hoping to wash his hands of the entire affair that was all easier said than done of course once the vin and engine number confirmed that this was the algar ferrari baker was taken into custody and after two short months of glorious ferrari ownership for the unnamed doctor the f50 was repossessed a sad day for a guy who had the same passion for cars as baker yet who unlike baker actually tried to buy one legitimately or at least what he thought was legitimately tom baker pleaded guilty to grand theft and was sentenced to eight months in prison serving just two days each week so he can make his commute from lexington to orlando for his job which he perplexingly still had so he more or less spent the better part of two years in jail from what i could find and the articles i found on the subject vary on just how much time he did but regardless i know more than a few people who'd be happy to do two days of jail time a week if it meant they got to have a ferrari f50 in their garage for five years but this is not where the story ends in fact this is where it pivots and gets downright weird you see prior to baker being sentenced to prison the f50 was moved to government storage where it remained for some time at least until may 27 2009 when it became clear that tom baker wasn't the only questionable character in this story ever hear of motors insurance corporation they're the insurance branch of general motors they were the ones who paid the claim on the stolen f50 listed in court documents as a 1995 model rather than the 1996 reported by the media although i'm not entirely sure how big a difference that actually makes if any at all regardless motors insurance corporation was essentially the official owner of the car for all intents and purposes so that's who the fbi called when they finally tracked the car down however since the vehicle was evidence in an ongoing investigation a representative for the fbi asked motors insurance corporation if they could hold on to the car for the time being fair enough motors insurance consented to the request allowing the feds to keep the car for now this is a meaningful distinction which will become important later but for the moment the car seemed to be in good hands everything seemed to be going well until the fateful day of may 27 2009 long story short fbi special agent frederick kingston met with the prosecutor in tom baker's case assistant u.s attorney j hamilton thompson so they can move the f50 to a different storage facility police comments later suggested the men were only doing about 40 miles per hour and the government's excuse was bald tires but regardless of the cause kingston lost control of the car slammed into a curb and left the car settling in some bushes resulting in the cars suffering a deep gash along the carbon fiber frame leaving the body looking like a victim in a slasher movie the accident opened up a universe of speculation kingston's and thompson's story about moving the car to a different storage location was convincing and logical enough but it didn't really seem necessary to move it in the first place and even if it had been necessary why not have it towed there so that you prevent from happening exactly what ended up happening which leads to the other possibility this was a joy ride gone terribly wrong either way the f50 was declared totaled due to the damage the car had suffered and yet it wasn't until june 17 2009 that the fbi informed motors insurance corporation which i'll be referring to as mic from here on out mic was informed and told by the government that they could submit a claim for damages yet i doubt the government was anticipating the size of the claim on july 15 2009 mic submitted a claim for 750 000 in damages what they alleged to be the fair market value of the car subsequently the government denied this claim needless to say mic was furious and demanded answers since they weren't buying the excuse about needing to move the car after making no headway with either the fbi or the department of justice mic filed a freedom of information act request to try and get to the bottom of just what happened that day and why this car for which they had paid over six hundred thousand dollars was now totaled the freedom of information act request was denied but mic persisted finally the department of justice spoke up and their response was basically straight out of lethal weapon too tough luck kid we're immune it may sound absurd but there's actually a basis in law for the department of justice's defense called sovereign immunity in essence a government can't be held accountable to individuals for property damage sustained during the performance of official duties since the car was totaled while in government custody and presumably during transfer from one facility to another this law protected the fbi and the department of justice from being sued for damages now mic was not without recourse thanks to the federal tort claims act of 1946 which waived the government's immunity from financial liability if certain circumstances were met not too long ago i was watching an episode of the waltons that made a passing reference to a b-25 bomber that crashed into the empire state building and i thought they'd made it up but not only did that actually happen it was the basis for the federal tort claims act the crash had caused the deaths of 14 people and over a million dollars in damages which comes out to around 14 million dollars in today's money as a 2008 npr report recounted quote eight months after the crash the u.s government offered money to families of the victims some accepted but others initiated a lawsuit that resulted in landmark legislation the federal tort claims act of 1946 for the first time gave american citizens the right to sue the federal government end quote mic utilized this ruling when they filed suit against the government in the michigan district court as sports market reporter john dranius explains in his 2011 article the fbi crashes in f50 the sequel the main point of contention was the conversation i mentioned a bit earlier between the fbi and mic a 5-4 supreme court ruling held that a prisoner could not sue for damage to property that had been held in police custody during the term of his detention but mic picked on the wording of the ruling since detention implies the owner was forced to surrender the property to the government whereas mic had consented to allowing the fbi to hold on to the car only after they asked the fbi never said this is evidence in an ongoing investigation and we're taking it no they asked if they could borrow the ferrari and mic said okay so in this case sovereign immunity wouldn't apply at least in their mind but the entire case ultimately comes down to whether kingston and thompson were actually working in the capacity of government agents when they crashed the car because if they were just two goofballs out on a joyride then obviously any sort of sovereign immunity sails out the window like aroma lines on a cooling pie even the district court ruling doesn't provide a conclusive explanation for why the car was being moved in the first place stating quote the circumstances as to why kingston and thompson were driving the vehicle are not entirely clear at least one document in the record indicates that thompson was moving the vehicle to return it to mic end quote now the court opinion declared sovereign immunity as an establishment that quote prevents suits against the united states without its consent and precludes district court's jurisdiction end quote but it grants that jurisdiction over the case and whether or not the u.s can be sued is ultimately decided by district courts under united states code title 28 section 1346b 1 which quote provides that district courts have exclusive jurisdiction over claims against the united states for damages caused by negligence of federal employees while acting within the scope of their employment under circumstances where the united states if a private individual would be liable under the law end quote so jurisdiction would fall to the district courts if this were a situation where the federal employees were acting as private individuals rather than government agents which is all well and good except for one tiny problem i couldn't find any articles that told me how the case actually ended i spent the better part of a rainy monday making inquiries about court documents even starting the process of filing a freedom of information act requests before discovering the documents were freely available and easily accessible in a district court archive but hey at least i didn't have to wait who knows how long for a response you know so how did the court rule was the government let off the hook or did they have to pay mic the full 750 000 they requested well the document i found was a ruling on the u.s government's motion to dismiss the case under sovereign immunity in the documents recording the ruling of the united states district court eastern district of michigan's southern division the honorable judge avern cohn wrote an elaborate opinion cohn writes quote mic concedes that with or without a citizen's consent the doj certainly has authority to seize and hold property including property owned by third parties as part of criminal investigations end quote cohn then goes on to write quote mic however says that because it consented to law enforcement's request to hold its vehicle as evidence its consent rendered the status of the vehicle as having been entrusted to law officers rather than detained by them under section 2680c mic says that the concept behind detention of property is the deprivation of control and a right of dominion over that property end quote and yeah that tends to be the definition of detention at least in a legal context right except cohn then writes quote mic then suggests that its consent foreclosed the possibility of this form of deprivation from occurring mic is mistaken end quote so this is where we get a fairly long-winded explanation of what the term detention means in the context of this case with cohn even pulling one out of the official handbook of last minute best man speeches by beginning a sentence with webster's defines blank as and in this instance he uses it to state that quote webster's defines detention as a detaining or being detained specifically a keeping in custody confinement end quote he then further backs it up with law dictionary definitions and wording by the sixth circuit as to what constitutes detention and sometimes there's just no winning cohn continues quote mic seems to misunderstand the role it and its vehicle occupied in the criminal investigation and prosecution that took place the government's purpose in holding the vehicle was not to create a status of either consent or punitive coercion between law enforcement and the vehicle's innocent owner mic rather the object was to control and preserve relevant evidence so as to see the criminal justice process through to a conclusion therefore simply because the government did not aim to force or punish mic by holding the vehicle it does not follow that the vehicle was not detained more accurately while its vehicle remained in custody mic was unable to exercise the right of possession over it mic does not allege that if it had asked for the vehicle's return the government would have given it back as such it was detained within the meaning of the statute end quote now this point is mildly infuriating if for no other reason than the assertion that had mic been able to prove that the fbi would have returned the car to them if they'd asked then maybe they'd have had a case but since the fbi probably wouldn't have given it back even if they had been asked then it was officially detained and no longer subject to mic's rights of possession in effect the car wasn't legally mic's property while the fbi possessed it but the only reason they possessed it was because mic agreed to let them possess it at least temporarily if the fbi or the department of justice had just pulled rank and taken the car fine there's no case but that's not what happened here the fbi asked first and because the fbi asked mic's attorneys maintained that the corporation still retained rights of possession an assertion which judge cohn resisted it actually gets really frustrating in subsequent paragraphs when judge cohn performs the juris prudence equivalent of victim blaming writing quote moreover regardless of who was storing the vehicle at the time the fbi clearly had sufficient control over the vehicle to be able to enter the facility have access to the keys and drive the vehicle from the facility indeed if it was true that a federal law enforcement officer did not recover store or otherwise detain the vehicle at any time then it would not be possible for mic to bring a claim against the government for the damage to the vehicle the only way the government could be tied to the vehicle's damage is because a federal law enforcement officer i.e an fbi agent detained the vehicle i.e was in custody and control of the vehicle when it was damaged end quote basically the only reason you guys could sue the government for wrecking your car is because the government wrecked your car but because it was a government official who wrecked your car you can't actually sue them for wrecking it because by admitting that a government official wrecked your car you're also admitting that they had legal custody of it which absolves them of any punitive responsibility for its wrecking can already feel a headache coming on judge cohen's ultimate ruling was as follows quote it is certainly unfortunate what befell mic's vehicle however the vehicle was damaged while being detained by law enforcement officers within the meaning of section 2680c as such the government cannot be liable under the ftca for what occurred accordingly the government's motion is granted this case is dismissed so ordered end quote signed avern cohn united states district judge dated september 27 2011. now i couldn't find any documents detailing an appeal of the court's decision so presumably it ended here with mic being denied their claim against the u.s government it's unfortunate that ultimately no one paid for what happened to the car outside of mic and that the one guy who served any sort of time for this whole nonsense mostly just served it on the weekends it seems rare to feel sympathy for insurance companies but seriously mic got the short end of the stick in this situation all due to a legal technicality that left them holding the bag now you could argue that maybe they could have gone after tom baker for damages in the sense that none of this would have happened had he not stolen the car in the first place but what are the odds they'd ever see dime 1 in that situation in the end mic ate all the cost and had hardly anything to show for the effort and that's rough no matter how you slice it we know about baker we know about the ruling we know about the government and mic but what happened to the car itself was it just destroyed was it just taken apart for scrap or was it restored to its former value well the good news is that a rich guy bought it or at least someone wealthy enough to theoretically attempt to restore the car to its former glory the details are scarce but here's the story sometime in late 2011 or early 2012 the wrecked car was placed up for auction on co-part a site for bidding on used and salvaged cars the car had allegedly been placed up for auction on behalf of motors insurance corporation in an attempt to recoup at least some of the money they'd lost and since this car placed up for salvage auction matched the damage on the ferrari f50 from the algar heist it was determined that this was the same car i mean it had to be right like who's gonna mess up a perfectly good ferrari f50 just to perpetrate a fraud on copart you know what i mean while mic didn't get the full amount they were asking from the us government they did get in the ballpark of half from the salvage auction as the car sold for 370 thousand dollars of course it probably cost the new owner thousands to get the car back to its former glory if he ever even did but let this serve as a lesson even if you get away with something like this for a few years the bill always comes due and not everybody is going to find a judge who lets them do jail on the weekends you

Channel: Regular Car Reviews

Views: 55,567

Keywords: Regular, Car, Reviews, Ferrari, Ferrari F50, Documentary, True Crime, Exotic Car, Ferrari F130, Ferrari Type F130, Algar Ferrari, Algar Ferrari Heist, Heist, RegularCars, RegularCarReviews, Regular Car Reviews, Regular Cars, RCR

Id: GFkvbdMYgHs

Length: 29min 51sec (1791 seconds)

Published: Mon Nov 02 2020