Long Beach, California - US authorities have recovered a Jaguar E-type stolen in 1968 outside a New York City apartment.
The United States Customs and Border Protection agency found the classic car on a ship bound for the Netherlands and tracked down the original owner, now 82 years old.
California Highway Patrol investigator Mike Maleta said on Wednesday the Southern California man who shipped the car from the Los Angeles and Long Beach seaport complex submitted export paperwork to customs in June and an analyst who checked out the car saw it had been reported stolen.
By that time, the crate with the 1967 Jaguar was already two days out to sea en route to the Netherlands, which is a hot market for vintage cars. Authorities arranged to have the shipping line hold on to the crate rather than deliver it, and bring it back to Long Beach, which it did in August.
Maleta said the owner, Ivan Schneider, was an attorney who had bought the car as a status symbol and had it stolen from outside his New York apartment one night in 1968.
Schneider, who now splits his time between New York state and Florida, called it a “miracle” the Jaguar was found and said he planned to restore the car, which had significant rust damage and needed some parts replaced, according to US Customs.
Lou Koven, a special agent with the National Insurance Crime Bureau involved in the recovery, said It was unusual for authorities to be able to retrieve such an old car, and they had the legal authority to get it back only because New York police had kept the stolen vehicle report from 1968.
Maleta said the seller had bought it a few months ago from a man in Turlock, California, who in turn said it was in his garage for 40 years. Investigators were still trying to figure out who might have stolen it 46 years ago, he said.
Reuters