A Seattle woman’s normal shopping trip turned into an unexpected crime scene when she found car thieves in her neighbor’s expensive SUV. It became a huge story on social media, with millions of people watching what she did.
A TikTok user named @caegfree was getting ready to leave her apartment building in the Uwillage neighborhood when she saw her neighbor’s gold Mercedes-Benz G-Wagon parked in the garage. The car had been stolen, and she knew something was wrong when she saw two strangers sitting inside it.
Rather than walking away or calling the police first, @caegfree walked up to the car and tried to talk to the people inside. The thieves quickly drove off and hit her car while escaping. She even ran after them for a bit before they got away. “Help me find these two tweakers who hit my car,” she wrote on her first TikTok video showing what happened.
This is why you shouldn’t confront car thieves yourself
Her video became really popular fast, getting over 11.8 million views from people all over the internet. Lots of viewers tried to help by looking at the video carefully. Some people figured out the license plate number was LHU 265 just from watching the footage. “Dude, the license plate is LHU 265, just go to the police with it,” one viewer wrote.
Some people thought she was brave for what she did, but others worried she put herself in danger. “This video alone would give the owner the ability to now do their own charges for theft. You have a hit-and-run charge. Two different cases with video evidence,” someone else said. The whole thing shows how risky it can be to go after criminals yourself, even when trying to help someone deal with a frustrating situation.
The good news is that social media actually helped solve the problem. @caegfree told her followers later in another video that someone who watched her video sent her a tip that helped find the stolen G-Wagon. She did not say what the tip was or if anyone got arrested for the theft. Nobody knows if her car got fixed either.
https://www.tiktok.com/@caegfree/video/7564990706897407262 This happened while Seattle has been dealing with a big problem of stolen cars. Police numbers show that 8,379 cars were taken in the city last year, which is 21% more than the year before. Most of the stolen cars lately have been Kias and Hyundais because videos on TikTok showed people how to steal them easily, but luxury vehicles like the G-Wagon have also become targets.
